


Too Soon, Too Late

by stayarmytinyzenmoa_l



Category: SuperM
Genre: EXO - Freeform, Enhanced Humans AU, F/M, M/M, Mafia AU, Other, Reader Insert, SHINee - Freeform, SuperM - Freeform, University AU, WayV - Freeform, lowkey lucas x reader, nct - Freeform, nct 127, superm x reader, x Reader
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 12:15:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 39,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28706523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stayarmytinyzenmoa_l/pseuds/stayarmytinyzenmoa_l
Summary: Mafia AU / University AU / Enhanced Humans AUGenre: Action, Light ComedyPairing: SuperM x Reader; Slight Lucas x ReaderSummary: Being the heir of an entire crime syndicate is no easy position to have, in some ways it’s harder than the head of that syndicate himself. But what better way to keep an heir protected than to assign the best members of to the case?Disclaimer: Please remember that this is an AU and a work of fiction, obviously the idols mentioned/written about in this story would never partake in or condone these actions. I would never wish any of these actions to occur to the Idol(s) mentioned in the writings of these stories, nor do I wish any harm on them. The idols mentioned in this work are meant to be seen more as face claims rather than the actual idols themselves.~Imported from my Tumblr @stayarmytinyzenmoa-l
Relationships: SuperM Ensemble/Reader, Wong Yuk Hei | Lucas/Reader
Kudos: 7





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Gambling, injuries, minor gore, language

Please see Character Profiles on my Tumblr here: <https://stayarmytinyzenmoa-l.tumblr.com/post/639627264568459264/too-soon-too-late-character-profiles>

“This shit is rigged,” Jongin cursed to himself, knocking the slot machine on its side.

The smoke, the cash, and the alcohol. Kim Jongin was in his element. Truth be told, had it not been for his job, he would’ve found himself here more often. He had a considerable amount of luck on his side, after all. Key word being had. After finding himself in the clutches of SM his luck had a noticeable downfall. As seen by the consistent losses in something as simple as a slot machine.

“Don’t lose your cool, Kai. If you get too frustrated you start glitching,” Taeyong’s voice crackled in his earpiece.

“I know,” he whispers. He looks over his shoulder at the blackjack tables, Ten had made himself comfortable at the one their Target was playing at. Sensing eyes on him, Ten glanced up and looked straight at Jongin, quirking his brow slightly, then going back to his cards. Jongin turned back to the machine and pulled down the lever, watching the slots roll down rapidly. “Status on the Target.”

“It’s not time yet. Just wait for Baekhyun’s signal,” Taeyong answered. Jongin didn’t miss the annoyed tone the younger bit back with, but chose not to bring it up. And based off of the fact that one of the hostesses had past him for a fifth time in the last hour, he had a feeling that he was already beginning to draw some unwanted attention.

Elsewhere in the casino, Mark stood at the bar, cleaning glasses and listening to poor drunks’ stories about going bankrupt in this money hole of a casino. Of course he knew that all the machines were rigged, of course he knew how much money was in a singular slot machine, that’s why their boss told them to infiltrate the place and bleed it dry. But the only thing on the younger’s mind was the calculus midterm the next day, and needless to say he was pissed. And it was apparently obvious, considering how many bar patrons would shrink as soon as he turned back around to get their orders.

“Hey, boy,” a man hissed across the counter. Mark looked up and pointed to himself. “Yeah, you, do you see any other scrawny boys at this fucking bar?” Mark sighed, but proceeded to place the glasses down and walk over to the customer.

“What can I get you?”

“Rum on the rocks.”

“You got it,” Mark turned around without another word, his hands moving mechanically around the bar, he’s done this enough times.

“Bartender!” Mark had to stop himself from whipping his head over to the familiar voice, but he recognized it well enough to be Taemin. “When you’re done, another martini for the lovely lady.”

“Sure.”

Truth be told, Mark hated casinos. He hated the smell of alcohol and smoke mixed together with cash, he abhorred seeing rich and poor alike waste their entire bank accounts on a pair of cards, and he absolutely despised the people in them. But orders are orders. It all came down to how well they blended in. They all had outside jobs, and Baekhyun and Jongin were most at risk for repercussion if they were caught dealing in the mafia. The others not so much, but still risky. The whole plan rode on how well and how quickly everyone would file out of the casino as soon as the scenario was set into motion. Of course, there were back up plans, but all of them weren’t ideal. Mark finished the drink and placed it in front of the drunkard, with another hand already preparing the martini.

‘Remember the missions,’ Mark recited to himself. ‘Get rid of the target first, then take the cash and bolt.’

Taemin was in his element. Back in the SHINee unit, he was usually the scout that went ahead first, benefits of being the youngest member, he supposed. His specialty was always in reading the situation and modifying the variables as he saw fit. It was almost like a story, in a way. And he was the author. With complete control of the settings and characters, Taemin would be considered a master manipulator. He never took chances with failure rates higher that 1%, and he was determined to keep it that way. Strangely enough, talking to this woman reminded him of his last mission in his older unit.

“Is something wrong?” She asks. Taemin glances down at his glass.

“No, sorry, princess. You were saying?” He gives her a charming smile and he could practically see her melting in her body.

“I was just saying that you don’t seem the type to frequent a casino, is all,” she mixes her drink with her fingertip.

“I’ve been told that I’m a man of many surprises,” Taemin laughs. He looks up at Mark for a brief second, and the younger shook his head slightly while continuing to mix the next drink.

Meanwhile, in the back alleys of the casino, Lucas and Baekhyun were working away at the lock to get in to the storage rooms. Taeyong’s blueprints showed a direct hallway into the control room, and if they were able to get in then they could get everyone out. But, truth be told, the annoyance in Baekhyun’s expression was slightly off putting.

It was uncharacteristic of the leader, that much was sure. Often times, one would never guess that he was a leader of one of the infamous SM units, let alone a part of one of their most feared units. Charming and easy to get along with, Byun Baekhyun was the perfect wolf in sheep’s clothing, and he knew it. No one knew how, but he found a way to perfectly balance the horrendous life of a mafia member, and the glamorous one of an Idol. No one suspected a thing, and he was certain to keep it as so.

On the other hand, Huang Xuxi, better known as Lucas, is the boy that was involved in the wrong crowd. A bet gone awry landed him in this mess. It was bad enough that he got involved, but he was more worried about the fact that he got Mark wrapped up in this mess with him. But despite the circumstances, Lucas had an incredible ability to adapt to his situations well, and he often times was able to get the other members out of predicaments that they couldn’t have on their own. An element of “thinking out of the box” is what Lucas has, and is what’s key in this mission, according to Taeyong.

“Can’t I just kick it down?” Lucas ran a hand through his hair and raised his leg, but Baekhyun shook his head and went over the numbers again.

“No, the noise will attract too much attention. Has Taeyong said anything yet?” Lucas pulled out his phone.

“Nope.”

“I’m crunching the numbers, give me a second. I’m kind of multitasking here,” Taeyong replies. “Oh wait, actually? Try out 4-9-3-7-8.”

Baekhyun punched in the code without a word and let out a relieved sigh when the light blared green.

“We’re in.”

“What’s that code, Taeyong?” Lucas asks, making sure they aren’t being followed.

“It’s the address.”

“What the hell,” Lucas groaned.

“Focus, we have to get into that control room.”

“Right, right…”

~

Now our final member sat comfortably in the Bunker. Wearing a tattered hoodie and froggy socks, Taeyong sat with his legs crossed in front of multiple screens monitoring the other six members of SuperM. He scooped another spoonful of ice cream in his mouth and enlarged Ten’s camera. He was speaking comfortably to the Target, they decided well in choosing Ten to be the one closest to him. But truth be told, Taeyong could see how hard Ten was trying to hold back.

Now’s probably a good time to mention just exactly who this target is. In the whole scheme of things, he’s just a number. Target K82. Usually the SM units get by without ever knowing the names of their targets, it helps them in dehumanizing them. Helps them get the job done quicker. But Taeyong took it upon himself to learn who their targets are. He took the time to find out their crimes. Target K82 is inexcusable, having thrown out his humanity the moment he opened that chat room and saw even a second of those videos. Sick. For once, Taeyong wished he just kept him as a number.

“Yongie?” Taeyong, without looking up from the many screens, waved absently as you walked in, two mugs of coffee in hand. You, on the other hand, were a strange presence in the group. Neither part of the mafia or entirely not apart of it, you usually just hung around since you had nothing better to do. At the moment, you found yourself in one of Lucas’ hoodies, oversized for you, but what’s new. And, to be perfectly honest, you’re somewhat of a back-seat teammate. You leaned over Taeyong’s chair and handed him his mug while you looked at the screens. “What the hell is Lucas doing?” You leaned closer to watch the boy, but you shouldn’t have been surprised.

“Why has this dumb casino been nothing but codes?!” Baekhyun ruffles his hair, the lights around them flickering slightly. Their voices were slightly muffled from the camera feedback, but it was sufficient. Lucas looks around, slightly panicked, but still able to keep his cool. He cracks his knuckles.

“This is taking too long,” Lucas looked behind him once before delivering a right hook to the control panel. Within seconds, the green ‘Access Granted’ flashed across the screen and Baekhyun, slightly dumbfounded, looks up to the cameras. “Aha, I knew that’d work. Let’s get into that control room.”

“That’s my boy,” you crack a smirk while Taeyong sips the coffee.

“Yeah, well, your boy almost triggered all the alarm systems.”

“He’s our resident lucky charm for a reason, Yongie,” you pat his head and take the chair next to him, stretching your arms above your head and making yourself comfortable. Taeyong hands you a headset and you tune into their channel. Dead silence, which was natural. Taeyong moved his mic away from his mouth.

“Aren’t you supposed to be studying for midterms?”

“Well… yeah, but I’ve been at it since 12, so I think I’m in need of a lil study break. Plus, I like watching you guys work together.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, I usually watch the other units do their thing. Maybe it’s because you’re all from different units, but your dynamic is different. I like it. It keeps me entertained.”

“Yeah, and I know you get bored easily,” Taeyong nudges you to the side playfully.

“Oh, hey, Xuxi and Hyunnie made it in,” you nudge your head back to the screens. Taeyong pulls his mic back down.

~

“Alright, listen closely because you only have one shot at this. Fuck it up and we gotta go straight to plan H.”

“What’s plan H?” Mark asks.

“It’s the one where Ten dies.”

“I like plan H,” Ten snickers.

“Ten, no!” You laugh.

“Okay, here’s the plan.” Taeyong straightened out his legs and opened another computer screen. “We currently have a fail rate of 2%, in order to keep it like that, we have ten minutes to finish phase one. Everyone needs to be out of the casino within ten minutes, the target needs to be eliminated within three minutes of that occurring, and that should leave us about half an hour to bag the cash and go. Got it?”

Without hesitation, the members of SuperM put the plan into motion. The alarms in the casino blared and the security guards, just like they were taught, made moves to escort everyone out. This was Ten’s cue. He grabbed K82’s wrist and pulled out a badge.

“Mr. Park, I’m Liu Yangyang, and I was dispatched to protect you by someone going by the name Red Fox.”

“Oh thank god,” K82 held on to Ten’s arm as he guided him out of the casino, towards the back doors to be specific. “Those damn moderators are good for some things.”

“Yeah,” Ten dragged him down the hallways. Taeyong tossed his jacket over your face. Obviously annoyed, you reached up to take it off, until you realized why he did it in the first place.

Click. Your hands froze.

“Was that a—“

Bang. You put your hands down onto your lap, leaving the jacket in it’s place.

Ten winced as he wiped the blood off of his suit.

“You couldn’t have waited for me to let go of him before you pulled the trigger?” He groans.

“I mean, I could’ve,” Baekhyun twirls the pistol around his hand. “But I figured I needed to get back at you for doing the same with L98.”

“That was decades ago!”

“It was my favorite shirt!”

“You’re still on about that?! I bought you a new one!” Taemin shouts into his earpiece.

“Yes I’m still on about that! It was comfy.”

“You got it at Walmart.”

“It was comfy!” Baekhyun shoves the pistol back in place. “Man this is messy. Boss said to leave him here though. Let’s go check on the others.”

Back in the main floor of the casino, things were, to say the least, messy.

Really messy.

“Sorry!” Mark smashed a bottle of liquor over one of the guards heads.

“Yong, I thought you said there weren’t any guards here!” Jongin shouts into his earpiece.

“Okay well they weren’t supposed to be there, hyung, geez.”

“It’s fine, just work around it!” Taemin was the next to shout, shooting down the closest enemy to him like it was nothing.

“Mark, Lucas, head straight to the diamond-member room and grab what you can,” Taeyong instructs. “There’s not much we can do with this twist, but we’ll have to make do.” Taeyong pulled up Mark’s position, making sure their youngest was handling things well. But as soon as he enlarged the screen, a bang resounded from it, and soon he was only facing static.

“No, no, fuck,” Taeyong hit the side of the monitor a few times. “That’s definitely the camera. Someone blasted it. Mark could be in trouble.” He ruffled the back of his hair.

“Lucas, get to the diamond room as fast as you can.”

“Got it.”

If it wasn’t clear enough, there was an unexpected road bump in the mission. And it’s not that Taeyong and Ten didn’t take it into account, it’s that they didn’t expect for it to happen so soon. Of course a casino like this would have a more “elite” security force, of course this casino, specifically one in JYP territory, would have their own units patrolling the area. However, they weren’t expecting it to be the equally famed and feared Got7 patrolling along with the normal lackeys.

The front of Jackson’s gun moved from the camera to the SM member in front of him, but as soon as he realized who exactly he was pointing the gun at, he froze.

“Holy shit you’re just a kid,” Jackson stumbled back right as Mark loaded his own gun.

“Yeah, made some mistakes, but don’t we all,” Mark tried his best to keep his voice steady.

Another truth, Mark hasn’t actually killed anyone. And he wants to keep it that way. He’ll do these missions, sure, he’ll debilitate someone, sure, but he won’t ever kill. That’s what his older members did, but not him. And he was really scared right now. Jackson Wang isn’t someone to mess around with, even the locals know that. Where SM does well in keeping their members hidden, JYP is very out with some of them, and Jackson was the one they prided the most.

But the oh-so-feared Jackson Wang turned out to be the first to put his weapon down and gestured for Mark to do the same, who, against his training, did as well.

“You’re in the NCT unit, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, and what about it?” Jackson made a move to take a step closer, but Mark responded by taking a step back. Jackson steadied himself.

“You’re going to the Diamond room?”

“Maybe.”

“Well guess what?” Jackson looks over Mark’s shoulder. “You were going the wrong way, kid.”

“Oh…”

“Though you’re not too far off,” Jackson glances behind him now. “I know you’re probably trained not to trust me, but the slots in the Diamond room are rigged to set off a trap if the money boxes are tampered with. Push the handle up twice, down once, and up again before you open it.” Jackson pulled out his gun again and shot the wall behind him before signaling to Mark to leave. Once he was out of sight, he tapped his earpiece.

“Bam, you listening?”

“Yeah. Why’d you let him go?”

“Come on, we were like that too.”

“Why’d you tell him about the slots?”

“I had to. He’s with SM, and in the NCT unit. God knows what they’d do to that poor kid if he showed up empty handed. If we thought our boss was bad, their boss is worst.”

“Yeah, alright, whatever you say, Jackson. You’re getting soft, you know.”

“I know, I know,” Jackson rolls his eyes. “I don’t care what you do to the older ones, I have a bone to pick with Taemin anyways, but make sure you don’t rip apart the NCT unit, god knows what they’ve been through.”

Mark almost ran straight into Lucas in front of the Diamond room, but the two were able to stop as soon as they heard the boom that came from the elite’s room. They turned their heads just in time to see some random money grabber get impaled on the wall behind the machines.

“How the fuck are we supposed to get the money out of that?!” Lucas’ expression dropped. Mark winced right as they past the body, but quickly focused on the handle in front of them. He grabbed onto it and hesitated for a moment. “Dude. It’s not worth it.”

“If I die, I left this month’s paychecks from Starbucks and the AMC on the kitchen counter, cash them in and it should be good for at least groceries,” Mark explains nervously. “Alright, I only have one shot at this, so here goes.” He pushed the handle up twice, down once, and up one more time. Again he hesitated. The air around the two boys just seemed to get thicker at each second. Then, taking a deep breath in. Mark pulled the door open. He and Lucas stood in tense silence for a few more seconds, not really knowing what to expect. But after a few more moments, they relaxed.

“Oh my god… I’m alive, we’re okay.”

“I mean, we’re not okay, we’re in this mafia-thing for a while,” Mark clarifies.

“Well, yeah but… Dude how’d you know how to open that?”

“Oh, uh, I ran into Jackson Wang, so he told me.”

“Jackson Wang? Oh, I know that guy,” Lucas chuckles. “Wait why’s he here?”

“Dude, he’s a part of Got7!”

“He is?!”

“Yeah! Wait, so how did you know him?”

“Oh, we grew up in the same neighborhood,” Lucas shrugs.

“Huh, small world.”

“Yeah, right?”

 _“Guys. Focus,”_ Taeyong’s voice interrupted their conversation.

“Right! Sorry,” Mark looks up at the security camera and waves with an awkward smile.

“How much did we need to get again?” Lucas asks.

“Uh… 90 million won…”

“How much is in there?”

“Probably about half.” The two looked at each other. “I say we crack open four of these and keep one to ourselves.”

“I’m down.”

“Alright then,” Mark cocked his head to the side and put on a confident smirk.

Aside from the chaos that were the two youngest, the two oldest members weren’t as lucky off as they were.

“Got7! It had to be you guys, huh?!” Taemin reloaded and pointed his gun at Yugyeom, who responded in a similar fashion.

“Something tells me the others are in similar situations to this,” the other sighed. “Look, man, just tell us why you’re shooting up our casino and we’ll leave you alone.”

“What’s there to explain? We get orders, we follow them.”

“You got orders to rob our casino?”

“We got orders to rob _a_ casino,” Taemin smirked.

“Oh fuck this, fuck you! JB! Let’s fucking end these guys!”

“Jongin! I need you here!”

~

“They’re not actually going to kill each other, are they?” You glance over at Taeyong.

“I mean, based off of their other run ins, no. They’ll probably come at each other until one of them gets bored,” Taeyong replies.

“Did you turn the sound off?”

“No, why?”

“Because I see glass breaking and Min shouting, but I don’t hear glass breaking and Nini shouting back.”

“What?” Taeyong sits up again and starts to run a quick scan of the system. Then, on all eight screens, the same message appeared.

 _‘Nice try_ 😜 _’_

“Of course it was Bambam!” Taeyong growled. He bit the inside of his cheek and turned to you. “Anyways, wanna help me boot Bambam out of the server?”

“Hell yeah I do.” You leaned forward in your chair and pulled one of the many keyboards closer to you. “I got the fire wall, you can deal with Bambam.”

“Obviously,” Taeyong flexed his fingers before getting to work.

You may or may not have partook in some hacking classes back in the day. And by hacking classes you mean watching Taeyong fiddle around with his laptop for hours on end every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. And by back in the day you mean last week. But one of your main strengths is how quickly you pick up on things, being primarily a visual learner, you learned the basic skills of hacking rather quickly. A fact that Taeyong was rather proud of. And certainly one he rubbed into the other members from time to time, but that’s a story for another time.

~

 _“What the hell, I just got kicked out from my own system!”_ Bambam shouts. Jackson breaks into laughter, momentarily stopping his fight with Baekhyun. Baekhyun leaned on one leg while he watched Jackson slap the the broken counter with his hand.

“You got kicked out?! What happened to your ‘completely fool-proof’ system, Bam?!” Jackson howled.

_“Oh my god, I can’t even listen to you right now.”_

“Oh god, okay, I’m good, I’m good,” Jackson stands up again. “Thanks for waiting, where were we?”

Baekhyun throws a chair at him and wipes the dust off his hands.

“There.”

“Oh, right,” Jackson pushes himself off the floor and grabs the glass next to him, smashing it on the other’s shoulder. Baekhyun hissed, but grabbed one of the shards on the floor and impaled it on Jackson’s leg.

“Honestly, you guys are making this so hard for us,” Baekhyun leaned back slightly to catch his breath.

“Yeah, we know, you’re just covering for those two boys in the diamond room,” Jackson rolled onto his back and pulled the glass out of his leg.

“What?”

“Don’t worry, Bambam cut the mics, no one can hear us,” Jackson groaned. “Look, we get it, you’re robbing a casino cuz your boss told you to, but we know what the NCT boys have to go through, so as much as we despise you guys, we’ll let you do your thing for them. We just have to make it look like we’re actually putting up a fight.” Jackson pulled out the leg of the chair previously thrown at them and hurls it towards Baekhyun.

“I’d say thanks, but I’d prefer if you didn’t pity us.”

“I saw what they did to Sicheng.” Jackson’s voice took a darker tone. “That’s fucking sick. And all he did was come back a dollar short. Imagine what they would’ve done to Mark and Lucas. Fuck that.”

Baekhyun took a second to let those words sink in.

“What did they do Sicheng?”

“You don’t wanna fucking know, Byun.”

~

“Still can’t get the sound working?” You walked around to the back of the monitors. “I’d say to force reboot the whole thing, but that’s risky considering you guys are in Phase 3 of the operation now.”

“Yeah, that’s what I was thinking,” Taeyong pulled Lucas’ screen in front of him. “Looks like Mark and Lucas got the money though, I think it’d be better to just get out of the casino before the police get there.” Taeyong looked at the screen to his left and pulled down his mic.

“Mark and Lucas have what we need. You have ten minutes to get out of the casino. Head over to the rendezvous point, hand over the cash, and get back to the bunker,” he instructs. You sit back down on the chair.

“Did they get enough?”

“More than enough, that’s good,” Taeyong relaxes into his chair once more and picks up his mug.

“Oh, that’s gotta be cold now, want me to warm it up for you?”

“Sure.” He hands the mug to you and watches you leave. He switches the channel on his headset.

“Mark.”

_“Yeah?”_

“You _did_ get enough, right?”

_“Uhuh, Lucas and I double checked.”_

“Cool, I know you grabbed extra since (Y/N) asked you to if you could, but if the Manager asks for more, just give it to him.”

 _“I know,”_ Mark hauls the bag over his shoulder and into the back of the car. _“How’s (Y/N)?”_

“They’re good, freaking out about the calc midterm, but otherwise, they’re good.”

_“Cool, they didn’t see the, uh, you know…”_

“Nah, I made sure they didn’t.”

_“Okay, awesome. We’ll be back at the bunker around midnight-ish.”_

“Alright, I’ll them entertained until then.” Taeyong pushed the mic back up just as you walked in.

“I miss anything important?”

“Nope, but they said they’ll be back in about three hours,” Taeyong pushed himself away from the set up and stopped by the TV. “Wanna watch a movie?”

“I’ve been dying to watch Onward!”

“Then that’s what we’ll watch!”

You made your way to him and sat comfortably on the couch, your legs stretching over his and your back leaning on the arm rest. He tossed the remote to you and you opened up Disney+.

The SuperM boys never lived a dull moment, that was true before their unit was born, and it will most certainly be true after. And they knew your status in the mafia, you were next in line, after all, the boss’ granddaughter. As much as they knew that you understood their position, they wanted to let you have as normal of a life as you could, given your circumstances. So they’ll shield your eyes, they’ll keep their secrets, and they’ll entertain your silly needs as long as they need to.

And you’re perfectly fine with that.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Injuries, Gore, Language

Lucas looked out the tinted windows of the van, watching the bright Seoul City lights dance across his vision. The ride was silent, almost as if they didn’t just rob a casino and kill one too many security guards. They passed by the police station like it was nothing, and continued on without anyone batting an eye towards their vehicle.

It had to be about three years now, once Lucas thought about it hard enough. I know, crazy, right? Lucas _thinking_ about things that happened in the past.

Regardless, it had to have been three years since he and Mark got involved in this mess known as the notorious NCT unit.

A bunch of misfit kids who made deals with the wrong people, that’s who they are. Wrong place, wrong time, usually. And often times the debts just keep piling up with no end, and that leaves the boys in an endless roundabout of work, never-ending, and always increasing. There were about twenty one of them in the network at this point, which is equally impressive as it is disgusting.

Lucas remembers what happened, it comes back to haunt him every night. All he wanted to do was get money for his parents, all he knew was that it was a transport job, pick something up and drop it off.

How the _fuck_ was he supposed to know that it was a dead body?

And who else was he supposed to call other than his best friend _Mark_ to vouch for his innocence? Of course, being a young man who had just moved to Korea, he would just go along with the random attorney who trailed behind Mark and explained the whole “situation” to him. He just wanted to get out of the police station, to be honest. The deal was simple enough, the attorney would get him out with no strings attached, and he would just have to do him a favor. So of course the boy said yes, and Mark being, well, _Mark_ , said that he’d help too.

And that’s how they got wound up in the web.

The NCT unit is usually in charge of cash collection, transportation, and clean up. Typically being the newest of additions to the mafia, no one would even suspect young adults or teens to be roped into this. They basically do the work that no one else wants to do. All the “cool” stuff is usually reserved for the EXO or Super Junior units.

“Lucas, pay attention,” Baekhyun waves his hand in front of his face and Lucas snaps back into reality. “We’re here.”

“Oh, right, I knew that,” he steps out of the van, grabbing the bag of cash behind him. Their Manager was leaning on the side of a wall, lit cigarette in his mouth and pistol hanging in the open. He looked up just as Baekhyun approached him.

“You knew that Got7 would be there, didn’t you?” Baekhyun hissed. The Manager just shrugged.

“Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t,” he flashes the leader a wicked smile and Baekhyun grimaced.

“That’s the only reason why you’d have _us_ go in instead of the 127 unit, they’re the ones in charge of missions like this,” Baekhyun huffed, he signaled for Mark to stand next to him. The Manager took the suitcase.

“I take it that K82 was well taken care of?”

“Yes,” Baekhyun kept his answers short. The Manager looks behind him.

“Where’s E-8?”

“ _Jongin_ glitched,” Baekhyun put extra emphasis on his partners name and the Manager rolled his eyes. Regardless, he opened the case and counted the stacks.

“Well, well, I’d say there’s some extra in here too,” the Manager smiles. “Good job, the boss will be pleased.”

“We just wanted to be sure,” Mark spoke up. Both Baekhyun and the Manager glared at him, and the small bit of confidence he had shrank. Ten dragged Mark behind him and stood up taller. The Manager narrowed his eyes, but Ten followed his gaze.

“What do we do about Jongin?” Baekhyun asks, diffusing the tension.

“He’ll figure out how to get back, I’ll relay to the boss the situation so he doesn’t take action against your unit,” the Manager tosses his cigarette on the floor and puts it out with his heel. “A job well done. We’ll contact N-1 when your next task is ready.” Then the Manager walked into the dark of the alleyway, leaving the five boys to watch.

“Sorry, Baekhyun,” Mark held his head low. Baekhyun sighed and put his hand on the younger’s head.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m just glad that the Manager didn’t do something to you. Let’s get back to the Bunker.”

“But what about Kai?” Lucas was the next to speak up.

“Don’t worry about him, my second command is much more useful than you chalk him up to be,” Baekhyun shrugs. “Once he recharges he can probably bloop back into his room.”

“Yeah, don’t worry about him,” Taemin nudges Lucas’ shoulder, causing him to stumble slightly. “Why so stiff? He’ll be fine.”

The puzzle pieces started clicking in Baekhyun’s brain once Taemin started up the van again. It wasn’t Jongin they were mainly worried about, it was the money. Jackson mentioned the repercussions for coming back short, but could he trust him? How did he even know about Sicheng? Considering the lengths SM goes to keep their members’ identities a secret. But it would explain why the NCT boys were more solemn than their seniors. It would also explain Ten’s shocked expression when Mark spoke up.

What happened?

“We’re back!” Lucas’ voice echoed in the silent bunker. Behind him, the other members of SuperM filed in, all tired from their mission, and all begging to lie down even for just a second.

“Hi— Oh shit, you guys look like, well, shit,” you grimace. Baekhyun offers you a tired smile while Taemin collapses on the couch. “Wait. One, two, three, four, five, six… where’s Nini?”

“Oh, uh, he glitched.”

“What?! So where is he now?!” Taeyong walked out from the control room. “His location hasn’t pinged on any of my devices…”

“Yeah, that’s cuz Got7 Mark ripped it out,” Ten replies with a short shrug. “It was really gross, and I’m pretty sure he had no idea that he was pulling out a wire that long, cuz he almost threw up once he yanked it out.”

“Ew, too much info, Ten,” you put the bag of chips you _were_ going to eat back in the pantry. “Wait, so why hasn’t he called us?” Mark tossed Jongin’s phone to you.

“Yeah, he dropped it in the casino.”

“Great, just great. For all we know he could be in Antartica right now,” Taeyong sighs. “How did the deal with the Manager go down?”

“Well, he was pissed that Jongin wasn’t there, but when we explained that he glitched he let off because there wasn’t much he could do about that,” Baekhyun replies. He looks over at you.

“That’s code for ‘time to get the fuck out’ right?” You ask.

“Sorry, (Y/N),” Lucas pouts.

“I’ll take it since you said sorry, Xuxi. Alright, I’ll be in back room then,” you got up from your seat in the kitchen and walked away. You were upset that they didn’t let you stay, considering that in a number of years they would have to start reporting to you anyways, but rules are rules. If Baekhyun tells you to leave, then you have to.

“Did you get anything from the Manager?” Baekhyun leans against the counter and Taeyong groans.

“Yeah, ’N-1, look into your next target K83, and don’t fuck up this time,’ in that exact voice,” Taeyong scoffs. “The file’s pretty extensive though, give me a day or two and I’ll find him.”

“Any overview?”

“Yeah, he’s a Professor at their University,” Taeyong points to Lucas and Mark.

“That makes that easy,” Lucas’ eyes brightened. “We got this in the bag then.”

“Yeah, it should be easy, but it’s kind of too easy, you know? All the file says is that he owes money long overdue, but there’s another part that was blacked out,” Taeyong frowns. He pulls out a small monitor from his pocket and turns the bigger screen behind him on.

“Hey, Mark, doesn’t he look familiar?” Lucas frowns. Mark leans forward and stares at the picture of the man on the screen.

“I mean, I guess he should since he goes to our University, but I can’t say I’ve seen him before,” Mark tilts his head.

“What’s the deadline—” Ten is cut off when you shriek down the hall. All six members immediately ran to your location and found that the entire back room looked like it was hit with a hurricane, but, more importantly, they saw you on your knees besides a bloody body. You look up at them with wide eyes.

“Don’t just stand there! It’s _Jongin_!” Your hands move up to the the sides of your head, trying to calm yourself down while Jongin took in labored breaths. Taemin ran into the main room again and threw around items in the cupboard before finally pulling out the medical kit. By the time he ran back, Baekhyun had already dressed the shallower wounds while Ten was trying to get Jongin to talk. Taemin got straight to work, cleaning the deeper wounds, removing the shrapnels from the EXO member, and what not.

“You good?” Lucas kneeled next to the spot you had backed yourself in. You give him a shaky nod.

“Sorry, it’s just… He teleported right in front of me and I didn’t know what to do,” you look down at your now bloodied outfit.

“Did he say anything to you?” Ten looked over at you.

“No! Well, if he did it was gargled,” you look back at Jongin, he wasn’t dead at least.

“Jesus Christ…” Baekhyun ran a hand through his hair. “He probably chose to teleport here since people usually aren’t in this room.”

“Yeah, I get that,” your eyes still haven’t left the bloodied and bruised man.

“Hey, (Y/N), think you and Lucas can fix up the med room? Taemin and I got this,” Ten nudged his head towards the door.

“Yeah, got it,” you nodded and let Lucas pull you up from the floor and into the next room over. You walked to the side cupboard first. “And now I know why Ten had you come with me,” you laugh. Lucas puts his hand on your shoulder and takes the sheets from the top shelf.

“You sure you’re okay? I get why that’s shocking, if you need anything I’ll help out,” Lucas offers. You shake your head and start making the bed.

“Ah don’t worry about it, I’ve seen Taemin’s arm almost ripped out of it’s socket, so I’ll be okay,” you wave him off, but the discomfort in your face is still clear. “I mean, it’s still scary though. It’s kind of a slap in the face, you know? Just a few hours earlier, Nini and I were talking about going to that new cafe down the street, and now he ruined my favorite outfit.”

“That’s just a pair of shorts and my sweater.”

“Exactly.”

“I mean, blood isn’t that hard to clean,” Lucas takes one of the corners of the bedsheet and tucks it under the mattress. “I mean, I would know, I think.”

“True,” you grab the IV from the corner of the room and roll it next to the bed. “Kind of random, and I know I shouldn’t be, but I’m kind of concerned that we don’t have a ready doctor.”

“Eh, don’t worry about it, Taemin knows what he’s doing,” Lucas shrugs. “But if it makes you feel better, we can call Joy up to check on him,” he shoots you a hopeful smile.

“That’s good,” you slump your shoulders. “I wonder what happened? Where did Jongin glitch to for him to come back like that?” The door behind you slammed open and you jumped up. Jongin leaned on the doorframe.

“Relax, I’m fine,” he says. You sit down on the chair to the side.

“God, well you almost gave me a fucking heart attack, Nini! What the hell?!” You grumble. Jongin gives you a weak smile and he moves over to the bed.

“Don’t worry about it, you don’t need to know what happened, I’m fine. I’m more worried about you, are you okay?”

“More worried about me,” you scoff. “I’m just surprised, definitely in better shape than you.”

“I said I’m okay.”

“He’s right, he just had six too many bullets in his arm,” Taemin rolled his eyes.

“We should probably get back to the apartment,” Mark stuck his head into the room. You and Lucas looked at him, then back at Jongin.

“Yeah, go ahead, I’m stable,” Jongin insisted. You eyed Taemin suspiciously, but his confirmation relaxed you enough to concede. Once the three of you were gone, Baekhyun entered the room.

“So what happened?”

“Glitched in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Jongin groaned, relaxing into the white sheets. “God, what the fuck does BigHit feed their units? I swear, if I didn’t recharge at the last minute I might have actually died.”

“BigHit’s operating in Korea again?”

“No, I glitched in America,” Jongin shook his head slightly, stopping as soon as the corners of his vision started blackening. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, if a random person just appeared on our meeting table I would’ve beat the hell out of them too, but still that was ruthless.”

“Damn, I bet, who’s the one who shot you?”

“Ugh, if I tell you you’d laugh at me,” Jongin slumped his head on the pillow.

“ _No_ , it wasn’t Park Jimin, was it?” Ten’s eyes grew wide, but once Jongin turned his head away he burst into laughter. “Dude! Nothing against the guy, but he’s not even their sniper! What happened to you?!”

“Dunno, but Jeon did beat my head in one too many times,” Jongin rubbed the sore side of his head while Taemin hooked him up to the IV. “Either way, like hell I’m gonna do that again.”

“Man, talk about bad luck,” Taeyong frowns. “They didn’t follow you here, did they?”

“Like they could follow me from America, Yong.”

“You know what I mean!”

“Yeah, I locked myself in the janitor’s closet before I teleported,” Jongin sighed. “How long am I going to be bedridden?”

“Well considering you have a pretty good healing time,” Taemin tapped the tablet a few times. “Few days, at least. You didn’t break any bones.”

“One good thing came out of the EXO unit,” Jongin huffs. “Alright, get out, I’m knocking out now, you people just stress me out.” While the other members left, Baekhyun, as usual, stayed behind.

“Did you tell us everything?”

“Am I talking to my Baekhyun or Leader Baekhyun?”

“Both.”

“Look, I dunno if it’s true, but right when I dropped they were talking about some rookies, or something like that. Don’t ask me for details, that’s all I heard,” Jongin explains. “To be more specific, I heard Namjoon say the word ‘rookies’ then all hell broke loose.”

“So you’re saying we should watch out for a possible new BigHit unit.”

“Yeah.”

“Shit,” Baekhyun rubbed the back of his neck. “BTS is already a damn juggernaut what else do they need?”

“Fuck if I know, how did the deal go down?” Baekhyun stopped pacing in front of Jongin’s bed. “Did something happen?”

“No, but I heard something strange. Jackson Wang told me first, so I didn’t know if I should believe him, but while I was finishing off the deal, things started to make sense.”

“What’s up?”

“How much do you know about the NCT unit?” Baekhyun pulls up a chair next to Jongin and kicks his feet up on his bed.

“What do you know? You’re our leader, they must have filled you in on some things.”

“All I know is that they’re just kids they picked up from the streets.”

“You know what their main jobs are?”

“Yeah.”

“You know who’s in it?”

“Of course.”

“You know what happens when they fail?”

“No,” Baekhyun kept his answers straight, and, for the umpteenth time, Jongin sighed.

“Look, Mark told this to me in good faith, so don’t act on anything. I’m only telling you because we’re close,” Jongin says. “Get comfy, this is a long one.”

~

“Yong, I don’t think there’s enough,” Sicheng put the last of the stacks in the suitcase.

“How short are we?” Taeyong walked over from the other side of the apartment building.

“A good $200,” he frowns. Johnny puts his gun back into his waistband and walks over.

The 127 unit was working a pick up case, but their target wasn’t exactly keen on having his money collected. Jaehyun had approached the target first, keeping the conversation civil, they just needed the money, that’s all. What he didn’t expect was a switchblade just inches away from his jugular. Johnny was, obviously, the first one to react, pushing past the other 127 members and throwing the target off of Jaehyun. He didn’t mean to kill him, honest.

But mistakes happen, they always do.

“$200? I have some money here,” Johnny pulls out his wallet. “Mark, you have anything?”

“Like… $2,” Mark frowns.

“Jae?”

“I have a $50 on me,” Jaehyun pulls out said bill.

“So all together that’s, what, $102?”

“Yeah,” Sicheng counts the bills. “$98 more.”

“I have a $20 here,” Yuta hands Sicheng the bill. “And Haechan gave me this,” he hands a $5 bill to him next.

“$73 left,” Winwin frowns. “Jungwoo? Doyoung?”

“We each have $20s,” Doyoung answers, handing said money over.

“I have a $20 too,” Taeyong adds.

“I only have $12,” Winwin grumbles. “It’s fine, they won’t notice, right?”

“It’s just a dollar, they shouldn’t,” Taeyong mumbles.

“Are you sure? Let’s dig around some more, he has to have more cash somewhere,” Mark speaks up. He walks over to the body, using one hand to cover his face from the smashed in head, and using the other to pat him down. “He’s gotta have, like, a wallet, or something…”

“Mark, we looked around for that already, what was under the bed was all that was in here,” Johnny pulls Mark up from the floor. “Donghyuck, clean that up, will ya?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Haechan shuts the fridge door and picks up a trash bag.

“Where do we meet the Manager?” Yuta asks.

“Same place as usual,” Taeyong answers. “Let’s go.”

“Yup,” Mark pushes the drawer back in the dresser, trying his best to ignore the large amount of varying children’s photos at the bottom of it.

“No wallet in there?” Haechan walks over, and Mark immediately leans on the dresser and shakes his head.

It was times like this when Mark wondered, should he feel bad for these people they’re “targeting?” Should he feel any form of remorse for them? In the end, everyone had skeletons in their closet, everyone had something to hide, maybe what they were doing wasn’t so bad at all.

But the heavy smell of iron constantly reminded him of one fact, they still _killed_ that man, and many before him. Regardless of what they did, murder is the worst sin of them all.

“Mark, are you paying attention? Let’s go,” Johnny waved him over from outside the apartment. Mark shook his head back into his senses and followed them out.

The drop off point wasn’t too far, just by the old shut down factory. They found the Manager there, sitting on a pile of dirty crates and going through his phone, the usual lit cigarette loosely hanging from the corner of his mouth.

“Got the cash, N-1?” He asks without looking up.

“Yeah,” Taeyong handed him the case. The Manager lifted it a few times in his hand.

“Did you get _all_ of what was due?” He pressed.

“Yes, sir,” Taeyong tried to keep his voice steady. This is his curse, really, Taeyong had always been so easy to read, sometimes he thought that was the reason why they chose him as leader. He wouldn’t be able to lie to them.

“Then you wouldn’t mind if I _counted_ it, would you?”

Taeyong hesitated for a brief second.

“No.”

“You hesitated, if there isn’t $200 flat in here, I’m going to have to teach you not to be short again,” the Manager hissed. He slammed the case on one of the crates and cracked it open, the neat stacks of green bounded by white filled the case side to side.

“$200, sir,” Taeyong affirmed. The Manager looked behind the young leader, straight at Mark.

“You, come count this,” he gestured for him to come closer. Mark did as he was told and started counting the stacks. “Every bill, N-12.”

“Right,” Mark started counting aloud. He was right at 192 when Sicheng spoke up.

“We were a dollar short,” he stopped Mark from talking.

“I _fucking_ knew it, you goddamn brat, you thought you could lie to me?” The Manager stood up straight and started walking towards Taeyong, but Sicheng put himself in front of him.

“It was me, I didn’t tell them we were short.”

“And you thought that I haven’t been in this business long enough to see that,” the Manager spat. Sicheng swallowed nervously and looked over to the rest of the unit, who looked ready to pounce at any second.

“No, sir.”

“You thought that I would overlook just one dollar.”

“No, sir.”

“Do you know what’s going to happen to you? To _liars_ like you?”

“No, sir.”

“Do you want to know?”

The air was thick. You would be able to hear a pin needle drop, if you listened hard enough. Johnny’s hand was already on his gun again, but Taeyong’s glare was enough to get him to not make a move.

~

“Mark spared me the details, all he said was that it was bloody and grotesque. He couldn’t sleep for months,” Jongin looked off to the side again. “But from what I’ve overheard from Qian Kun, Sicheng’s stable, but he hasn’t said a single word since.”

“Why did we get caught up in this mess, Jongin?”

“Who knows. We’re not that different from them, Baek. We were just two kids in the wrong place at the wrong time too. It just sucks that it was SM that came to pick us up.”

Right outside the room, Taeyong leaned against the wall, listening to every single word. He expected Mark to tell Kai about what happened that day, it haunted him for years, and he never got the proper closure. He regret stopping Johnny from acting that day, but at the same time he was more afraid of what would happen when the boss found out that they had killed the Manager. He was shocked at the amount of detail, however. It concerned more than it impressed him, though. Mark was always the type to keep things to himself. He never wanted people to worry. But at the same time, that alone was what kept the young leader up at night. Mark was the exact opposite of him, always being able to keep his thoughts hidden, he hoped there would be someone who would be able to read him, and if that person was Jongin, he didn’t mind.

~

“Mark, what?! Are you kidding me? No!” You toss the dice on the floor while Mark cracks up. “How the hell are you so good at this?!”

“I dunno, (Y/N), but I think being involved in money collection gives me an automatic upper hand in Monopoly,” Mark reasons.

“All that gives you is an upper hand in stealing it…” You mumbled.

“What was that? Just sounds like you can’t hold a property for too long.”

Since the three of you had collectively decided to ‘fuck midterms,’ it was your bright idea to play Monopoly, which was infamously known as the never-ending board game. It was just collecting dust on top of your closet anyways, so why not put it to good use and just not sleep?

“This is so _dumb_! Give me a chance, Markie!”

“No way, you’re gonna have to get good at this too eventually,” Mark argues. “Anyways, just roll the dice already!”

“I already _did_ , bitch boy!”

“It is a peaceful day in the apartment,” Lucas narrates over the noise, organizing the stacks of monopoly cash. Lucas moved your piece for you and placed the $200 Monopoly bill on your pile.

“Thank you, Xuxi, this is why you’re my favorite,” you smile. “Anyways, roll already, Mark.”

“Dude, just give me a second,” he snickers. He rolls the dice onto the board, which knocked over the community chest cards.

“Bruh, you’re just rolling dice, not causing a damn earthquake,” you say in between laughs.

“Who’s even winning?” Lucas asks, pulling up the instructions.

“I have no clue, I just know I have bought all of these properties,” you run your finger along the bottom half of the board.

“That’s not fair! I didn’t know how to play!” Mark complains.

“I _asked_ you, Mark!”

“Anything is true when you lie.”

“Oh my god, I am not dealing with this right now,” you put a hand up and shake your head. “You are lucky I love you, Mark Lee, otherwise I would’ve kicked you out of this apartment.”

“Dude you can’t kick me out I’m literally your source of income. Without me you two would be living in a box!”

“For the record I’d make it a comfortable box,” Lucas adds in.

“I know you would.”

“I really would.”

“Wait so what’s going on?” Mark looks back down at the board.

“You bought six hotels, you own the other half the board, and you have the most money.”

“I feel like this game is more fun with more players,” Lucas squinted his eyes.

“We should invite the Dreamies next time, I always worry about those kids…” you puff your cheeks slightly. “Besides, Jisung texted me and said he misses us.”

“Jisung texts you?”

“I’m in the Dreamy group chat!”

“Wait, how come I never hear from you?!”

“Oh, I’m not in that chat, I’m in a different one.”

“Wait, there’s another group chat without me and with you?”

“Yes, why’s that so hard to believe?”

“Pics or it didn’t happen.”

“I’ll show Lucas first.”

“That’s cheating, he literally goes with anything that you say, (Y/N)!”

“That’s the point, Mark.”

“You know what? Give me that,” Mark swipes your phone off of the table and stands up.

“ _You_ — I can’t believe you’re using your height against me, short stack!”

“I am half a foot taller than you, (Y/N)!” Mark unlocks your phone and opens messages.

“How do you know my password?!”

“It’s 9894!”

“What does that mean?” Lucas tilts his head.

“It’s your name, Xuxi,” you look at him and you see the cogs running in his head.

“Oh shoot, really?! That’s so funny, my password is your name!”

“Oh my god, stop it,” your jaw drops slightly. Then you remembered that Mark Lee has you phone.

“Are you fucking kidding me?!” Mark whips his head back at you, and now it’s your turn to break into laughter. “Who named the groupchat? Who was it?!”

“It was Jisung!” You roared.

“Jisung named the group chat the ‘Fuck Mark Lee Club.’ Jisung did that?”

“Yeah!”

“Wait let me see!” Lucas walked over and scrolled up the text messages. “Can you add me to this?”

“Yeah sure,” you grabbed your phone and added Lucas.

“Wait, wait, add me too!” Mark walked behind you.

“Mark you can’t be a part of the Fuck Mark Lee club you _are_ Mark Lee.”

“Would you add me in if I said I hated myself.”

“Mark, baby, that’s not what we mean by Fuck Mark Lee.” You and Lucas stared at him for a hot second when it finally clicked in his brain. One thing you always thought was adorable was that Mark’s blush started in his ears first then it made it’s way down.

“Oh my god,” he said in a small voice. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah.”

“And it was Jisung’s idea.”

“I mean, it’s a joke, but yeah.”

“Oh my god,” Mark walks around the room for a second. “Oh my god, really?”

“Oh forget this,” you shove your phone in your pocket. “I’m heading to breakfast with a classmate of mine.”

“This late?” Mark looked at you flabbergasted.

“Dude it’s like 7 am.”

“This early?!”

“Yeah, Mark, this early, cuz my partner is an early-bird and has a ton of late classes.”

“What class is this for?”

“Bioenginnering lab. So none of you guys should know him.”

“Oh, okay, hey, let me walk you,” Lucas grabs his coat from the couch.

“Nah, nah, it’s good. Your next class is at noon, go to bed! I kept you guys awake for this long.”

“You sure?” Lucas eyed you suspiciously. “We _are_ your bodyguards, you know. Your grandfather could slit our throats if something happened to you.”

“Oh, that’s fair. Alright, you can come. But, you gotta go to bed Mark, you have a midterm,” you point at him.

“Yeah, yeah, Lucas is protection enough anyways,” Mark nods his head. “Good luck!”

“Yup,” you wave at him and walk out.

It didn’t really bother him, actually. Lucas, is who we’re talking about by the way. He’s way more than used to sleepless nights, it comes with being a part of the NCT unit, or really the mafia in general. He and Mark only had leeway since they’re charading as students so as not to blow their bodyguard covers. Plus, he does genuinely care about you. You were the first person he got to know when he got wrapped up in this business anyways, there’s a reason why he’s your favorite and he knows that. Either way, walking you to school this early in the morning was nice, and something he could get used to.

“So, what’s your classmate like?”

“Xuxi.”

“I have to ask! Best friend duties!”

“And not bodyguard duties?”

“Maybe a little.”

“He’s just my classmate,” you insist.

“ _He_ , huh?”

“Oh my god, it’s not like that. Again, just classmates,” you laugh. “He missed the last lab yesterday so he asked me if we could meet up and I could fill him in on what he missed.”

“Oh, okay, so nothing bad.”

“Of course not. Even if it was, I’m not weak, you know,” you deadpan. “I still consider one of my greatest achievements in life being when I wiped the floor with Yuta.”

“Oh, he definitely hasn’t forgotten about that.”

“I bet,” you come to a stop in front of a cafe. “So, you’re going to go home and sleep, right?”

“Yeah, totally.”

“And you’re not going to hang around outside here like a puppy, right?”

“Of course not.”

“Okay then, sweet dreams! I’ll text you once I’m in class.”

“Sounds good, bye!” Lucas waved at you until you walked into the cafe. He peeked in long enough to see you sit in front of a boy with blonde hair, then he relaxed and walked back to the apartment.

“(Y/N), hey, thanks for meeting me this early,” he laughs.

“It’s no problem,” you shake your head and pull up the chair in front of him, placing an order for your usual coffee. “Where should we start, Yeonjun?”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Language

You see, it is very easy to make Wong Yukhei feel guilty. It could be something as simple as frowning that makes his big heart sink. Even a slight eye roll would be enough to get him to bend and do what you say. But at that same time, he is very adamant on doing his job, and he is very adamant on doing it correctly for reasons that have already been explained, he couldn’t take chances on failure, it’s non-negotiable, because it could quite possibly not just be himself getting punished, as he has observed many times before.

Which is why he was sitting on top of this tree right now, watching you talk to your classmate, and also reporting to Mark.

 _“Dude I get that you’re worried about (Y/N), but you do not need to tell me how annoyed you are about the guy’s face every two seconds,”_ Mark laughs.

“I just think he looks annoying,” Lucas pouts. “We could’ve been finishing up Monopoly if it wasn’t for him.”

_“Bro we wouldn’t be able to finish Monopoly if we had all the time in the world.”_

“What are you talking about? We so would’ve!”

 _“Don’t lie! I saw you slipping extra bucks to (Y/N)! Where does your loyalty fall?”_ Mark feigns hurt.

“Wait, wait, development in the case.”

_“Really?”_

“Another person is moving to their table.”

_“Lucas, come on, maybe they’re just another classmate who wanted to say hi to them.”_

“Okay, sure, but what if?”

_“Dude, relax, I’m sure they don’t mean any harm.”_

“Yeah he kind of looks like a nerd anyways.”

_“See? Relax. Plus if he tries anything you’re there.”_

“That is also true, okay, I’m good now. I’ll report if I see anything else.”

_“Yup.”_

Now you, on the other hand, are not dumb in any which way. Did you know Lucas was in that tree? Of course you did. Honestly, he needs to change up his hiding places more often, it’s dangerous to use the same one a multitude of times. But you know he’s just looking out for you, he always does, and whether it is because you truly are friends or if it’s his job alone really doesn’t matter to you, after all, that’s how this business works.

Speaking of, another thing to note is that you most certainly are not a push over, no way. As also mentioned before, you wiped the floor with the one and only Nakamoto Yuta, one of your highest achievements now and forever more, you’ve frequently proven yourself not just to your body guards but also to your soon to be co-workers ~~you _hated_ calling them subordinates like what your grandfather did~~ that you were more than capable of protecting yourself. To be fair, that was a result of your grandfather’s actions much less of your own, but it is one that you were somewhat grateful for despite all the broken bones. Martial Arts do hurt, after all, and being forced to learn Systema at a young age certainly wasn’t easy, but you got by. Then again, you really could understand Yukhei’s concern for you. It must have stemmed from when you first met, certainly, you both joined the mafia around the same time. How old were you again? You knew that Lucas was seventeen then, so you had to run the numbers from there. Oh, numbers were never your friend, all you knew was that it was a while ago, and it is certainly an event you didn’t want to remember. That night was manic, after all, you don’t think either of you have gotten over it.

But that’s a story for later.

“Actually, I don’t want this to come off as rude, but could I just see your lab notebook really quick?” Yeonjun asks. “Sorry, I think there’s something about the formatting I’m not getting.”

“Yeah, of course. Plus, I know you always do your work,” you take out said notebook and hand it to him. “Don’t worry, look through whatever you need in there, I really don’t care.”

“Thanks, (Y/N), you’re a lifesaver,” Yeonjun opens the notebook right at the lab he missed. “I tried asking the TA to just let me go to one of today’s sessions, but he was being so unreasonable.”

“Ugh, can I honestly say that I hate our TA. Like, I get that he’s trying, but I get this weird feeling that he wants to lock the doors and turn up the carbon monoxide in the lab room,” you groan.

“Oh thank god it wasn’t just me.”

“He’s seriously terrifying,” your eyes go slightly wide.

“He looks like he was a serial killer in his last life,” Yeonjun laughs. You crack a grin and take out your tablet, opening your notes for Calculus, after all, you did ditch the idea of studying in favor for playing Monopoly.

Right at this moment, while Yeonjun was going through your notes, you feigned busyness, really thinking about your precarious situation. Being the grandchild, even an illegitimate one at that, of the Lee Soo Man is a dangerous thing, and if someone were to somehow piece the puzzle together it would spell out bad blood for you, and you knew this, you knew this well. So you tried to just keep a low profile in general, only sticking to the people you needed to. However there were always the very few stragglers outside of SM Town that figured you out, and you naturally reported the majority of them to the boys so they could deal with it.

Emphasis on the word ‘majority.’

You see, one of your closest friends may or may not be from another gang.

Not to name any names, what? Another gang? Haha, that’s cute. And funny.

And would 100% get you killed.

“(Y/N)!” Seungmin ran up to you and pulled up a chair. “Oh, Yeonjun, right? Hi, I’m Seungmin, (Y/N) and I are friends. Anyways,” He showed him a tight lipped smile and turned to you.

“Seungie! What’s up?” You tilted your head to the side.

“Me personally? I’m great. But you, once I tell you what happened, will not be so great.”

“Why?”

“Yeah, it’s bad, (Y/N), like, really bad,” he presses his lips together. “So, uh, Felix may or may not have lost the entire powerpoint.” You looked at him and he looked at you, no words were shared, none were needed, just _pure_ disbelief.

“Ah, really?” You nod and look at Yeonjun. “Sorry, you don’t mind if I sort this out, right?”

“Oh, no, of course not, I get it,” Yeonjun nods. You shoot him another smile and Seungmin pulls out his laptop.

“How the heck can you lose an entire powerpoint?” You slump your shoulders. “All the information on even _one_ slide took a whole night to research.”

“I don’t really know the details, but it _is_ Felix,” he frowns.

“Can’t you ask Minho to recover it?” You half whispered.

“I already did, but he got mad at me,” Seungmin’s frown deepened. You looked at him for a second.

“How rude.”

“I know!” He slides his laptop to you. “Lix said he just pressed the red button.”

“Seungmin, I am a computer whiz. If I don’t get back our presentation in ten minutes, call Felix ahead of time and tell him to write his fucking will.”

“Mm, okay,” Seungmin took his phone out and had Felix’s contact up. As soon as you opened the terminal on the laptop, you were met a series of anti-hack codes, which was normal considering Seungmin’s own position, but you were surprised with the… complexity of everything.

Oh, if it wasn’t obvious, your “good friend” is indeed Seungmin of Stray Kids, JYP’s own money collection unit. It should also be noted that Stray Kids are one of the few JYP units that are hidden from the public, although their existence is known, their identities are not. According to rumors, their unit leader who put them together may or may not be one of this generations’ actual geniuses.

Which were stated in his own words, of course, so it must be taken with a grain of salt.

Not that it’s important, but you and Bang Chan didn’t exactly start off on the right foot. Even though Seungmin, to your knowledge, is the only one who knows about your grandfather, you were surprised by the third degree given to you by their leader. Sure, the two of you are somewhat okay now, but you’re definitely bound to have some sort of bitter taste in your mouth when you remember that your first time meeting Chan included not only a security check but also almost getting blown up. Of course, you had to pretend that you didn’t notice for sake of seeming like you were an innocent goose, but it still pissed you off to no end and Seungmin had to do _everything_ to make sure you wouldn’t expose him and the rest of Stray Kids.

But let’s get back on track.

Seungmin himself was the group’s spy, which was probably how he found out about you in the first place, be it from his own pure curiosity or actual need to find the successor of Lee Soo Man, you two ended up coincidentally running into each other and getting partnered for a history project. So while the possibility of getting killed hung over your head, somehow a friendship grew.

Plus the two of you liked to bitch about your own respective units, so it was all in good faith.

For now, at least.

“Fuck,” you cursed under your breath. You knew Taeyong could crack this computer code in two seconds, but then again how the hell would you explain that he needed to break a firewall from an opposing mafia member’s laptop for a _history_ presentation?

Yeah, I couldn’t think of one either.

“Come on, come on,” you retried several binaries, but each of them failed. “How much time left, Seungie?”

“Two minutes.”

“Right,” you laughed. You typed out one last binary code, hoping to god that it worked. You watched the green ‘processing’ appear on the screen a multitude of times, followed up by the tedious series of ellipses racing across from left to right, until you were finally met with a slide on the Goryeo Dynasty, and you honestly felt like crying. “Please tell me I went overtime,” you turned to Seungmin.

“Unfortunately, you were just three seconds shy of ten.”

“Aww,” you pushed the laptop back to Seungmin “Well at least we have our presentation back.”

“Yup,” Seungmin nodded and made sure to save the presentation. Your phone alarm went off and you quickly scrambled to turn it off, seeing the words ‘GO TO CLASS’ on your screen.

“Ugh, geez, I forgot about that alarm,” you rubbed your temples.

“I take it this is the usual time you wake up?” Yeonjun chuckles.

“Yup,” you pocket your phone again. “I’m gonna head to class now, yeah? I’ll text you later when I’m done with the first half of the report.”

“Sounds good, (Y/N),” Seungmin nods.

“Oh, and Yeonjun you can just give me my lab notebook back later when you’re done,” you slung your backpack over your shoulder.

“Really? That’s a huge help, thanks, (Y/N). I’ll text you where we can meet up,” Yeonjun flashes an angelic smile.

“Do you want me to walk you to class?” Seungmin offers. You turned your head to just outside the cafe and made brief eye contact with Yukhei, who thought he was being slick, and watched him hide behind the tree.

“Nah, it’s okay, I’m gonna meet up with another classmate on the way anyways.”

“Oh, alright then,” Seungmin waved goodbye and Yeonjun followed the gesture as you left. The two boys watched you leave the cafe, and a new tension sat in the air, one that had people staring, all expecting a scene to break out, but to their disappointment, no such thing would occur.

Now, to the naked eye, maybe some nosy college students would chalk it up to a “who can catch the fish first” sort of situation, but it was more of an “I’m on to you” situation. See, Seungmin had reason not to trust Choi Yeonjun, I mean, the guy seemed suspicious the moment Seungmin caught him beating the _hell_ out of some guy in an alleyway. In Yeonjun’s mind, it was more of a “why does this guy look at me weird?” At least, to Seungmin’s knowledge, Yeonjun doesn’t have a clue about his suspicions, hopefully.

Another thing you have learned about Seungmin is that his intuition isn’t one to be trifled with, the kid has been right a number of times now, and it seriously gave you chills. He hasn’t really told you this yet, per se, but he has a really bad feeling about Yeonjun, and he’s seriously debating on slipping a tip to Yukhei, but he has no physical grounds yet, and reasonable doubt isn’t smiled upon in his line of business. Regardless of what it is that he’s feeling, it was strong enough to get him to delete the entire powerpoint himself and blame it on Felix just to have an excuse to come between you and Yeonjun.

Knowing this, he came to the resolution that he’d follow this lead to the end.

~

Was being friends with another rival member bad? _Yes_. But is it bad if you technically didn’t _know_ that he was a gang member? _No_. So you could use that little white lie if things went south. Plus, it’s not like you and Seungmin ever actually _shared_ what your respective units were doing, let alone spoke about sensitive information, that’s a dumb move. To be honest, as much as you didn’t like to call it this, it was more of a “keep your friends close and your enemies closer” sort of situation. You and Seungmin could benefit from being close, after all, it would be easier to find alliances when you needed it.

Now, to those who are curious how exactly Seungmin found out about you was simple, he just traced a path, quite literally. A string of connections that you weren’t being careful of, and _ta da_ , he found out that the successor of Lee Soo Man was a student at Seoul University, so he followed the lead and eventually landed on the ethereal being that was Lee (Y/N). See, the only reason _why_ you didn’t report him to the boys was simply because of the fact that he was doing this very project, and it would’ve been such a bitch to do it on your own. 

The friendship actually started with you, the famous lines being: _“You’re going to kill me anyways, so I’m just going to talk smack on my unit since I know you understand.”_ And as soon as you started talking about how incompetent really any of them could be, Seungmin was quick to sympathize, adding his own experiences into the mix, then _boom_ friendship. Of course, the two of you had to meet up every now and then outside of school so that’s how you slowly became acquainted with the other members of his unit. And he became somewhat familiar with Mark and Lucas.

You really hoped that you wouldn’t end up fighting him anytime soon, you actually liked Seungmin.

“(Y/N)!” Lucas ran up to you.

“I thought I told you to go to sleep?” You tucked your arms behind you and walked with a slight spring in your step.

“You did, and I decided I wasn’t tired,” Lucas shrugged.

“Hmm, whatever you say,” you take your phone out and whip around, taking a quick picture of him.

“What was that for?”

“Two reasons, one, you are ridiculously photogenic,” you show him the picture and he could only nod in response, “and two, if people who are bothering me just won’t shut up, I’ll show them this picture and tell them you’re my boyfriend.”

“Smart.”

“Yes, sir,” you smirk.

“Why don’t I take you out on an actual date?”

“Good luck explaining that to my grandfather.”

“Right, um, rain check?”

“Anything for you, Xuxi.” The two of you come to a stop in front of your bioengineering lab. “I’ll see you later?”

“Duh.”

“Alright, tell the guys I said hi.”

“Of course, good luck with class,” Lucas shoots you his signature smile. And, with one of your own, you opened the door to your lecture hall and walked in. But, right as the door was closing, Lucas saw someone he really wished he didn’t see.

~

“WE HAVE A PROBLEM. WE HAVE A BIG PROBLEM!” Lucas barged into SuperM’s meeting room, shaking the sweat out of his hair.

“What? What’s wrong?” Taemin was first to respond while Mark tossed a water bottle to Lucas. Lucas chugged down the whole thing and took a breath before responding.

“You guys know K83?” Lucas looked around and walked up to the large screen at the front of the room. “This guy. K83.”

“Yes, we are well aware of what we are targeting, get on with it,” Baekhyun leans forward on the table.

“Yeah. This guy is (Y/N)’s bioengineering professor.”

Silence.

Total silence.

“This is unexpected,” Kai leans back in his chair. “And it makes things a bit more complicated.”

“What do you mean? Can’t we just off the guy like with the previous targets?” Ten asks.

“No, this is more sensitive now. Because now we have to take (Y/N) into account as a variable.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t mind one less class.”

“That’s not what he means,” Taeyong was quick to add in. He reconnects his laptop to the screen and pulls up K83’s case file. “So, like what the boss said, he owes a shit ton of money to SM. But what he left out is what he was using that money for.” Taeyong pulled up the receipts from K83’s purchases.

“Looks like he’s just paying off bills,” Mark states.

“Yeah, that’s what he wants people to think. So just in case, I did some extra digging,” Taeyong switches tabs again. “Our target’s name is Dr. Shin Yoon Bum, accredited professor, made monumental discoveries in the field of bioengineering, particularly in bio-weaponry, and is a loving husband of forty years and a foster father, _wow_.”

“So pretty normal,” Mark shrugged his shoulders while Taeyong switched the slides.

“By the way, he uses the orphans he adopts as test subjects.”

“Oh _fuck_ just kidding,” Mark’s expression drops. Baekhyun sits back.

“So no one questioned why his orphans just go missing?”

“They never filed them as missing,” Taeyong shrugs. “According to all the records, they’re ‘alive and well,’ but according to my own research, their eldest hasn’t closed his eyes in three months.”

“Ew, oddly specific,” Ten cringes. “How did you know that?”

“Sources.”

“Do you always do research on our targets like this, Taeyong?” Baekhyun breaks the side conversation.

“No, I just happened to look more into him this time because I knew he lectured at their university, so I wanted to be sure we wouldn’t have any hiccups,” Taeyong looked at Lucas. “Clearly, I overlooked a detail. It won’t happen again.”

“I mean,” Jongin cut in. “That information is good to know, but it still isn’t what I meant,” he shakes his head.

“What? Then what are you talking about?” Taeyong pouts.

“Well, I’m sure Mark and Lucas should know about this,” he gestured to the two boys, “but anyways, since K83 is (Y/N)’s bioengineering professor, it would be safe to assume that this is the exact same professor that they have been doing extra research for. Based off of what they’ve been complaining about recently, they would die before considering doing extra research for their chem professor, plus it’s not their field, and they’re not too keen on what their bio professor is researching either, so that leaves K83.”

“So basically, you’re saying that there’s a slight chance that (Y/N) might have unknowingly contributed to K83’s, uh, _unconventional_ research?” Taemin leans forward.

“Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“So we operate without them knowing,” Baekhyun offers. “We’ll just have to come up with a cover for their professor somehow.”

“I don’t know about this one, leader,” Ten chews the inside of his cheek. “I don’t think (Y/N) would appreciate being lied to. I know we’re all big on letting them have the most normal life possible in their situation, but we can’t forget that, maybe in the near future, it will be (Y/N) we report to. I’m not saying they’d do anything bad to us, per se, but we have to keep future relations in account.”

“We won’t have to worry about that if we work around it well enough,” Taeyong crosses his arms over his chest. “All I need is a day, I’ll figure something out to make this go smoothly.”

Ten eyes his co-strategist with a small amount of suspicion. It wasn’t normal for the two to disagree, after all, or even be set on two different perspectives at all. Making decisions with absolute certainty was their pride, after all. But Ten was smart enough to know when his opinion was outnumbered, his teammates had a fierce loyalty to you for a reason, after all, and he of course was included, but for now he’ll have to just go with the majority. He’ll reason it out with himself later, at the very least.

“Alright then,” Ten concedes, “so scratch everything we just said.”

“Right,” Taemin sadly deletes his entire word document and looks at Baekhyun.

“Start from square A, infiltration.” Taeyong slid the tablet to Baekhyun and he opened a whole new presentation.

~

“Oh, um, Professor Shin?” You walked up to the graying man with your tablet and textbook in hand. He himself finished up logging out of the lecture hall’s computer before turning to you.

“Ah, Lee (Y/N), one of my best students, what can I help you with?” He asks.

“Well, actually, there was a certain concept you explained earlier that I just didn’t understand, can I make an appointment with you for office hours?”

“Of course, it’s the least I could do since you and your peers are helping to advance my research,” the Professor nodded, but then he sighed. “Actually, I’m going to be stuck in my lab all week, do you mind if you just meet me there?”

“Of course not, I’ll be sure to bring my lab coat and goggles,” you affirm.

“That works then, what time are you thinking?”

“My best time is tomorrow at four,” you open your phone’s calendar.

“That should be fine, I’ll expect you then,” your Professor nods.

“Thanks again, Professor! I’ll see you tomorrow then,” you bowed your head slightly before exiting the class.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Language, Graphic Depictions of Gore, Unsettling Themes, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Kidnapping, Blood, Breaking Bones, Nightmares, Mentions of Murder, Suicide

“Help me!” You screamed into the darkness. No one was around, you were alone. Alone, cold, and terrified. How did you even get here? The details were so murky, one minute you’re with your older brother and the next you were on your own. Behind you was the sound of heavy footsteps, and something metal grinding against the floor. Could they be your savior?

“Where are you?” The voice sang, not asked, _sang_.

Yeah, no, he definitely wasn’t here to help you. You struggled against your restraints and tried to push yourself away from the voice while trying to make as little sound as possible.

“Come on… I won’t hurt you,” he continued in the same sing-song tone, and it only made you even more terrified. “I just have a bone to pick with your grandfather, and you’re the only one of his hell spawn without security.”

Grandfather? Who was he talking about? Both of your grandfathers had died years ago. You continue to shift away, further and further.

“Plus… you’re not too bad on the eyes, aren’t you, (Y/N)?” His voice would have been described as soothing had it not been for your situation. “So cute, I almost want to keep you. Maybe I’ll do that instead of delivering your head to Lee Soo Man’s doorstep.” You had to focus your efforts on not sobbing. You just wanted to go home. You continued to push yourself back until you felt the one obstacle that would signal your doom. The cement wall. Then, you couldn’t see him, but you knew he was standing right in front of you, your captor, the one who wanted to kill you for whatever reason it was your “Grandfather” did.

“(Y/N)!” A different voice called out your name. You heard your captor’s voice growl, and you felt the metal crowbar come into contact with your shoulder and you let out your own cry of pain mixed with those of anguish, knowing that you’ll never see your family again.

“Just stay still,” the crowbar came crashing down on you again. And again. And again. You didn’t even want to imagine the mangled mess you would become, it was all too much. It was like every time you screamed louder the pain would just increase and the assault would never end. But then it stopped. And your heard the sound of bones cracking alongside the sound of the crowbar being tossed aside. Then a new presence was in front of you, untying your bindings.

“Are you okay?” He asked. You shook your head. “That’s fair, I wouldn’t be either. Let’s get you out of here, alright? Your grandfather sent me, you can trust me, I’m here to help. You don’t have to be afraid anymore, okay?”

“Who are you?” Your voice was trembling, and rightly so. But the sudden screech of metal across the floor invaded your calming mind, and sent you into the downward spiral of fear.

“Wait here.”

“No! Don’t leave me, please.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep you safe,” the voice affirmed, but when you heard him grunt from pain, and more sounds of crunching, you only felt more horrified, what with the mental image of someone being horribly beat pervading your senses. And all you could do was bring your hands to your ears to try to block out the shouts and the curses, including the sounds of blood splattering and bones breaking. But it was nothing compared to the terror that coursed in your veins when you suddenly felt blood splatter across your face, the way you shrieked combated that of someone being brutally murdered.

“(Y/N)! Wake up!” Your eyes shot open and Lucas’ hand retracted from your shoulder and fell to your bedside with his expression was filled with concern. You looked to him and tried to form words, but none emerged. He reached over to you slowly and cupped your face, wiping the tears off with his thumbs. “You’re safe now.” Oh how a simple sentence could bring so much comfort. Lucas had somewhat of a sixth sense when it came to you, he couldn’t really explain it, but it’s there. If he was asleep, he’d wake up in an instant if something happened to you, if he was apart from you, he’d feel chills run through his body. And _never_ has his intuition been incorrect.

“I know,” you choked out, bringing your hands to cover his.

“It’s alright, it was just a nightmare.”

“I know.”

They didn’t come to you as often as they used to, the nightmares, that is. Always the same, but never at the same time. You knew there were some missing details, some hazy occurrences that you are assuming are better that you didn’t remember. One thing you knew for fact is that every time you had that nightmare, Lucas would just _know_ what exactly it was that happened in it. He of all people should know, he was there.

And, unlike you, he remembered _every_ detail.

It was mentioned before, but the person who saved you that night was the one and only Wong Yukhei, it was his first job from being roped into the NCT unit, after all, and he was desperate to clear his name as soon as possible, and what do you know, a pick-up job for the grandchild of his most despised boss was the one offering the most pay. At first, part of him was wondering if he should give you a piece of his mind, release all the anger that he had holed up since getting tangled up into this web. It was simple enough, drive to their house, tell them their grandfather sent them, then bring them back to the base. With nothing but an address and a name, he began his job.

He was, to put it simply, shocked when he knocked on the front door to your family’s apartment unit in Daejeon to see a sobbing mother with freaking out brother and a fuming father in the midst of argument. The obvious question of ‘How could you lose your younger sibling?!’ was heard a number of times, and the replying ‘I don’t know!’ was just as frequent. This is when Yukhei’s blood started to go cold, at first he didn’t want to intrude, but an unfinished job, according to his seniors, would lead to twice the debt, and he couldn’t afford that. So he knocked on the door, and who he assumed to be your older brother opened it.

“Can I help you?”

“I’m looking for (Y/N).”

“They’re not fucking here!” He heard your mother shout from the inside. Your brother covered his eyes for moment. Lucas noted the family pictures behind him, they were all pristine in comparison to the cluttered apartment, seemingly immune to the leaking ceilings as well.

“They’re not here,” he finally responds with a shaky voice.

“Sir, with all due respect, I need to find them,” Lucas pressed. Again, your brother shook his head.

“I can tell you where I last saw them, and you can go from there, but trust me, if they haven’t texted either of us, you probably won’t find much,” he could tell that your brother was trying his best to tune out his parents sobs. Lucas wasn’t particularly paying attention, but he heard mention of a “step-father,” which made sense considering your lineage. Just what kind of person were you? He had been expecting a grandiose manor, not a run down and berated apartment, he had expected an aged butler, not a distraught brother, and, probably most obvious of all, he had expected you to be there, but you weren’t. But he did notice the strange look on your brother’s face, he was hiding something, that much was obvious. Lucas could have pried it out of him, he could’ve taken the gun from its hidden spot in his jacket and held it up to your brother’s head, but he chose not to. Some secrets are best left untold.

Instead, Lucas went to your last known location, with what little leads he had under his belt. He couldn’t help but think about how horrible a person you could be, given how terrible your grandfather was, you couldn’t be too different. However, with all the signs that came from your apartment, how could you be horrible? You had parents who clearly cared about you, your brother looked like he was about to kill himself from the stress of losing you, your family clearly had no money _at_ _all_ , just who were you?

He stopped cold in his path when he finally followed your trail to the notorious Warehouse #3, the same one he had only heard stories of from his seniors, the location of all of their demise. But any and all trains of thought were certainly thrown out of the window when he heard a scream of bloody murder. That’s when instinct kicked in, he ran into the warehouse, really not having a plan at all, and that’s just his style, but he looked for you in the darkness of the night, having only the piercing screams to go off of. It’s human instinct, he thinks, to be protective of others in danger. He moved quietly, feeling his way around the dark hallways and, at all times, kept his handgun loaded and ready. Then a new voice pervaded his senses.

“I just have a bone to pick with your grandfather, and you’re the only one of his hell spawn without security.”

“I don’t have a grandfather!” Another voice, obviously terrified, yelled in response. Lucas already knew who was who.

“Oh, sweet thing, if only you knew,” the deeper voice cackled. “Plus… you’re not too bad on the eyes, aren’t you, (Y/N)?” His voice brought shivers down Lucas’ spine, even, he could only imagine the terror you were in.

“Please, please let me go home! I don’t know who you’re talking about! My name is Kim (Y/N)! There’s no one in my family with the last name Lee!” It was that statement that spelled volumes for Lucas.

_You didn’t know._

You didn’t _fucking_ know what was going on.

The puzzle pieced itself together, you had gone missing earlier that day while you were with your brother, but you didn’t wander off on your own, you were taken by whoever this was, and whoever this person was had bad blood with Lee Soo Man, of course, what’s new? But how did this person find you? It took Lucas a great deal of time and resources alone just to find out where you lived. It was when he heard the sound of bone meeting metal that finally got him to break into a sprint, it was dark in the warehouse, but he just barely made out the outline of two figures, and that of one shaped like a weapon. His first instinct, surprisingly, was to grab the crowbar rather than to pull out his own gun. The other retaliated, but he threw it out of his hand, then the rest was just fight or flight. He wasted no time in twisting the offender’s arm behind his back, and he didn’t give a _damn_ about the sound it made when it snapped in half, nor did he care about how much blood seeped into his clothes. He pushed him aside and knelt in front of you. He was able to untie you successfully before having to go in to break your captor’s other arm, but that didn’t occur without consequence. He didn’t notice the crowbar swinging towards his side, but he did notice the damage it caused when he heard his ribs crack. He wiped the blood away from his mouth and grabbed onto the bar again, pulling it out of the other’s hands and brandishing it himself, he brought it down on the enemy, over and over again, until he heard no more sounds coming from him or, more specifically, when he heard you scream from the array of blood that he was certain painted the walls when he was done.

He was good at hiding it, to those who weren’t there that night, they wouldn’t have been able to tell. It was yours and Xuxi’s little secret, with nothing but a scar to remind him. If the higher ups had heard about it they would’ve increased his debt tenfold, which is definitely not what he wanted. It healed slowly, and nicely given how mangled it was, and he was lucky enough for it to have been his non-dominant side that was injured, but the damage was just so _obvious_ that it was almost horrendous to look at all the scars. It was always the source of self-loathing to him. It was a sign that he didn’t complete his job to its best.

“Can you stay here? Just until I fall asleep? I know you’re just the next room over, but this is easier for me.” Lucas was pulled back into the realities of the present time by your request.

“Of course,” Lucas pulled your desk chair over next to your bed and settled himself there. You, on the other hand, wrapped yourself up in your blanket again, closing your eyes and steadying your breathing patterns. Soon enough, you were fast asleep.

You weren’t at all who Lucas expected you to be. Of course, there was the possibility that you were lying, but Lucas kept track of the signs, and all of them pointed to you being in the wrong place at the wrong time. But it all made sense, didn’t it? You were so distantly related that no one should have drawn the familial line to you, but someone found that erased line, and they retraced it to the poor unknowing teenager that was, at the time, Kim (Y/N).

You followed him out of the warehouse, with your head hung understandably low, and your voice never going beyond a whisper. He was kind enough to offer you a cloth to wipe the blood off, luckily, at least your face didn’t look like you just stepped out of a murder, very contradictory to your clothes, but anything helps. Once you were both in the moonlight, you had to clasp your hands over your mouth to not scream at the sight. You had no clue what happened in the darkness, for obvious reasons, but the aftermath is one you would have never expected to see. Any normal sixteen year old, aka yourself, would be horrified to step near a bloodstained person who’s side was noticeably gaping. He noticed your stare and threw his jacket on, whispering a quiet apology. You pondered getting into the car with him, you had some trauma with getting into cars, especially ones with tinted windows, and this he noticed too.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he reaffirmed. You looked over to him, taking note of the sincerity in his eyes. “Again, your grandfather sent me.”

“Both of my grandfathers are dead.”

“You have no clue who you are,” he shook his head sadly.

“Can’t you take me back home to my family? I know they’re worried sick.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Why?”

“I just,” Lucas paused for a second. There’s no way he could answer that without sounding the selfish, “I can’t. Please, just trust me.”

You didn’t know what compelled you to listen to him, but whatever it was, it gave you the strength to open the car door and seat yourself inside. He followed straightly after and started the car.

“Are you okay?”

“I’ll live, I’ve always been considered lucky,” he frowns.

“Oh, I see,” you looked out the window, ignoring the searing pain in your own shoulder. “Who are you?”

“I’m Wong Yukhei,” he answers. “You can trust me, I won’t hurt you, alright?”

“Okay…” Then the silence fell again.

“Your family is worried about you,” he says after a few minutes. “I went to your apartment to pick you up first. I can give them some kind of closure, but I can’t take you to them, I’m sorry.”

“I see…” you tug on the seatbelt uncomfortably. “Who is my grandfather?”

“Probably one of the worst people on this planet,” Yukhei answered vaguely.

“I bet, if it meant me nearly dying for a person I don’t even know,” you mumble. Lucas pulls into a parking structure and the two of you get out. You passed a few people who nodded towards him, and you were just about at the doors of your “Grandfather’s” office when a woman stepped in-between the two of you and the door.

“If you think you are going to let her go in there looking like that, you’re dumber than you look, rookie,” she scoffs towards Yukhei. “I thought I could at least trust you, kid. You must be (Y/N),” she turns to you with a smile on her face.

“That’s right, Kim (Y/N),” you introduced yourself.

“And you didn’t tell her, really, Lucas?” She clicks her tongue. “I’m Joy, I’m going to help you out, okay? You can’t go in there looking like that, sweetie,” she takes you by the arm gently and pulls you towards the infirmary, but with each step, you couldn’t stop the anxiety from welling up in you, the fear of being in a strange place and on your own.

“Wait, wait, can he come with us?” You pointed back at Yukhei. Joy looked at you with confusion, then up to Yukhei.

“He has to…” Joy’s voice halted when she saw him shake his head. “Yes, he can,” she said unsteadily. Lucas caught up with the two of you and you walked into the infirmary. Lucas leaned against the wall while Joy sat you down in front of her. She taps on the pager in the walls.

“Lee Taemin, get down to the infirmary,” she says into the speaker. She pulls a tray out from next to the cabinet and gets to work on your shoulder. “I’ll bring you a new shirt, do you mind if I cut this one up by the shoulder?”

“Go ahead,” you nod. You felt the cold steel of her scissors, but chose not to mind it, having gone through worse that night. The door behind you opened and closed, and a new person entered the scene.

“What happened to you?” He seemed to ask Lucas first.

“Warehouse #3,” is all he responded with, and the other fell silent, instead he found his way next to Joy.

“What’s up?”

“The monitors are acting up again, can you recalibrate them? I’m working on Miss (Y/N),” she says.

“Oh, so you’re the famous Lee (Y/N),” Taemin’s lips curled into a smile.

“Kim, Kim (Y/N),” you corrected him. The corners of his lips turned downwards and he looked back at Lucas, who only shook his head in return.

“I’m going to ask again, what happened to you two?” He finally asked when Lucas moved to sit behind you. You found yourself leaning on him slightly.

“What’s there to say? It was dark, there was a guy with a crowbar, nothing good, really,” Lucas says. Joy finished wrapping the bandage on your shoulder and pats it carefully.

“All set, love, I’ll grab you a shirt now,” she says. “You can change in that room over there, I’m sure you wouldn’t want to undress with two idiots in the room.”

“Hey,” Taemin glared at her, but she just shrugged.

“Take your time,” she handed you the folded shirt and you moved into the backroom. Everything was a daze for you right now. You still had no clue where you were, and you were honestly too afraid to ask. You could tell that at least Lucas and Joy were good people, but were they really? Lucas saved you from your kidnapper, but at the same time he won’t take you home. Joy seemed nice enough, but what if she’s just acting since you’re supposedly their boss’ granddaughter? And of course, who _is_ your grandfather, and why have you never met him until now? You slipped your bloodied shirt off of yourself, taking time to memorize the details on it before chucking it into the trash, it’s not that you’re materialistic, it’s just that it was a gift from your brother. Your brother who is probably tearing his hair out right now. You pulled the new shirt back on and left the room. The three other people in the room were in a deep conversation, speaking with hushed voices. Lucas noticed you staring and stood up from the bed.

“Ready to go?” He asks. You nod and he waits for you to catch up before he opens the door. Joy tossed him a roll of gauze and the appropriate dressings.

“Just in case the bandaging comes off of (Y/N),” she winks. You had a feeling that they were more for him rather than for you. “Remember what we talked about, Yukhei,” Joy says, you couldn’t tell if it was a warning or not, but all he did in response was nod. Again, you and Lucas walked down the dimly lit corridor, going back to the foreboding door that seemed to radiate an intense aura of intimidation. He put his hands on the doorhandles then turned to you.

“I’ll be right outside,” he says, and then the panic in you started building up again, but why? Why did you suddenly feel so afraid when he wasn’t with you?

“You’re not going in with me?”

“Do you want me to?” He looked at you with genuine curiosity. Despite your efforts, all you could do was nod.

Lucas thought for a moment. He’d be risking _everything_ right now entering that room. He could have his debts increase for more ridiculous reasons, he could get scolded by the _worst_ person to get scolded by, or, worse, he could get downright killed for entering without permission. But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that he’s talking to the second most important person in the SM Town mafia right now, _you_.

“Alright then,” he nodded and opened them slightly, he let you in first before joining you.

Each step felt like you were weighed down by a chain and ball. The path to the mahogany desk just seemed to get longer and longer, and with each step Lucas fell more behind. The golden name plaque seemed to mock you, and all it read was ‘Lee Soo Man.’

“Stop there,” a voice boomed. You obeyed, taking in a deep breath as the leather chair turned around.

You really should have expected your grandfather to look old, and that he did. He looked aged beyond his years and almost as if he’d have trouble doing things on his own. Oh, but how looks could deceive, you’d find out later about the horrors he has done. But right now, at this very moment, he had a smile on his face, just like that of a person who had just been reunited with a long lost family member.

“You look just like your father,” he said in a warm tone. “You don’t remember me, I can tell. But we met when you were just a baby,” he chuckles. His eyes stop at Yukhei, but they moved back to you.

“Is that true?”

“It is, I was so happy to see you welcomed into our world, little (Y/N),” he reminisces. “But then your wretch of a mother took you and ran away. Oh, my son, my poor son, he killed himself from the grief of being separated from his child… But I see she has raised you well, and with a different family. You never knew of what you should have become,” he clicks his tongue and begins to pace around the area in front of his desk.

“But family, I believe, stays together. Don’t you agree, (Y/N)?” He turns to you, expecting an answer.

“Yes.” You should’ve known it was a trap, but at the time, you didn’t.

“That’s the spirit,” his face softens, but his tone quickly darkens. “N-11. What are you doing here?”

“They asked I come in, sir,” your Grandfather’s glare deepened. “Is that not a direct order from the second in line?”

“You’re smarter than you let on, N-11,” he continues his pacing. “(Y/N), I take it that many people you’ve run into have been calling you by the family name ‘Lee,’ am I correct?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Because that _is_ your family name. Your mother lied to you all these years, (Y/N). She _lied_ to you to keep you from us, your real family. I promise you that you will have the life you deserved from here on out, the life of riches you should’ve been showered with,” he comes to a stop in front of you and places his hands on your shoulders. “What do you say, my grandchild?”

“Thank you for your offer, but I really want to go home,” your voice was shaky, and you were afraid. But you had no strength to pull away from your Grandfather, for some reason, you feared the consequences.

“But you _are_ home, (Y/N),” he nods to you expectantly. “And, like you said, family must stick together. You didn’t _lie_ to me when you said that, did you?”

“No.”

“That’s good then. Don’t worry, I will have everything situated for you, you don’t have to lift a finger, my grandchild. You’ll begin your new life, the one you should’ve had,” he taps your shoulders and releases you. “N-11, take them to N-1, he already knows what to do.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m putting them in yours and N-12’s hands, I’m sure they know the consequences for what will happen if something _unexpected_ occurs, right?”

“Yes, sir,” Lucas answered stiffly behind you.

“You’re in good hands now, (Y/N). And _don’t_ think about going back to those monsters, I only want what’s best for you, you know that. You’re home now, where you belong,” he gives you another twisted smile and sits back behind his desk. “You may go now.” You saw Lucas bow his head and you followed suit, turning around slowly and walking out of the office. As soon as you were out, you were greeted by another person who was just standing outside of the office.

“Holy shit, you’re alive, Lucas!” One of them said with wide eyes.

“You got the news?”

“Yup,” he turns to you. “Hi, I’m Mark Lee, or N-12, as the boss puts it.”

“Oh, hello,” you waved to him.

“If you have any questions, feel free to ask us, we’ll help in any way we can,” Mark says. “Let’s take you to Taeyong.”

“Alright,” you followed the two to another room.

To cut a long story short, Taeyong, N-1, handed you a few documents. First, a new license and ID Card, one with the corrected ‘Lee (Y/N)’ on them. Second, he showed you your amended legal documents, it was slightly concerning how fast and how easily he was able to change them, but you didn’t expect less of a hacker. Business aside, he was another friendly face, but that also meant one you seemed more guarded with. Actually, you couldn’t tell which one was more guarded, you or him, you hoped that it wouldn’t leave bad tensions between the two of you. Lastly, before you left, he handed you a flash drive, explaining that it had everything you needed to know on it, and everything you were expected to learn.

And that’s what started you on this path, one of no return. There were certain rules you had to follow. The first one was obvious, don’t contact anyone from your past life, and if you happened to run into them, insist that you are Lee (Y/N), and that you haven’t met them. Rule number two, don’t leave the complex alone (this was later amended when you began college, but even then Lucas and Mark went with you). Rule number three, and perhaps the most important one, don’t let anyone know you’re affiliated with the mafia. The consequences were too high, too risky, and you didn’t want to try your grandfather.

Moving back to the present day, you followed these three rules, and the fine print in-between, quite well. You had even come to grow close to all of the members of SM Town, and, you would hope, they see you more as a colleague as opposed to their future boss.

It was your blaring alarm that woke you up. You had a dreamless sleep, which is the one you preferred. You turned to your bedside, noticing that your desk chair had been pushed back neatly, as if it were never disturbed in the first place. Then you finally pulled yourself out of bed, being sure to comb the tangles out of your head before exiting your room.

“Morning,” Mark shut off the stove and moved the eggs onto a plate. “Breakfast for you, your highness.”

“Wow, thanks,” you yawned. “Where’s Xuxi?”

“Oh, he went out early. He got called on by some of the higher ups,” Mark explains, but as soon as your eyes grew wide with shock he added on to his statement. “Nothing bad, don’t worry. They just wanted an update on how things were going here.”

“Oh, right, okay,” you grabbed a fork from one of the drawers and ate one of the eggs.

“Why’d you get up so late?”

“My discussions today got cancelled, something about lack of participation,” you laugh.

“Oh, so you’re just going to stay home then?”

“Nah, I have to meet with my professor later, I think I’m gonna fail his class so I need him to explain some concepts,” you say.

“I can help you out, if you want,” he places the frying pan into the sink and fills it with water.

“Nah, it’s upper division bio stuff, you wouldn’t get it,” you teased him and he shot you a small pout. “Don’t worry about me, plus, I know you have a meeting with the guys around that time anyways.”

“Yeah, talk about timing, right? I know you’ll be good but I have to say it just in case your grandfather bugged our apartment. Be careful,” Mark grabs a fork of his own.

“Alright, I did my thing. Why’d you get up so late?”

“Didn’t sleep too good last night, Johnny was texting me _nonstop_ about what’s been going on in the 127 Bunker.”

“Do you miss them?”

“Just a little,” he laughs. “Your meeting’s at four, right? I remember you mentioning it to me.”

“Yup, right around then,” you look at the clock. “Which means I should probably start getting ready, you look like you’re about to head out.”

“I am, text me when you get there, yeah?”

“Of course, when haven’t I?” You tilt your head and grab your phone.

“See you in a couple of hours,” you leave the kitchen right as he makes his way to the door. You heard it open and close, then you heard him lock the door, leaving you alone in the apartment. “Alright then, let’s get ready… Okay, goggles, check, lab coat, also check. Should I bring my gloves? Nah, his lab is in the newer building so it should have some stocked…” you continued to ramble to yourself as you got ready. Once you were all set, you grabbed your bag and went outside, ignoring your loud neighbors who were arguing yet again about something, you stopped paying attention a long time ago, and you descended down the narrow stone stairs. You somehow lucked out in finding this apartment considering that a bus stop was just on the next block and you were on your way to your university for the day.

Once you were off at your stop, you let yourself switch to auto pilot, pulling out your phone and, looking both ways, you crossed the street. You shot a quick ‘I’m here’ text to your group chat with Lucas and Mark before putting it back in your pocket, and you stopped in front of the lab building, you placed your ID under the scanner and watched the green line run up and down the piece of plastic. Soon, the light on the door turned green and it unlocked, letting you inside without any problems. You stepped into the elevator, pressing the correct button, and patiently waited as it descended. The doors opened again to a new lab with assistants and students alike walking around in an ordered manner, every person had their place and tasks to worry about.

“Ah, Lee (Y/N), welcome to my lab,” your professor walks up to you. “Would you like a quick tour?”

“Certainly,” you followed him around.

“My research is focused on genetic engineering and genome manipulation. I believe that we can force mutate certain sequences in the genetic codes of living things to make a stronger more advanced form of that species. And we have all of the technology right here, we just need to perfect it,” he comes to a stop in front of the live subjects, lab rats to be exact. “Take specimen A, for example. We wanted to find a way to enhance his eyesight, and we did. All we had to do was utilize CRISPR {[1](https://armytinyzenmoa.tumblr.com/private/638995098437386240/tumblr_KksoOeEc5BDAAS7ar)} to change a sequence in his genetic coding to allow this to happen. Or look at specimen B, we had injected him with a form of rabies and, also with CRISPR, we injected a coding sequence that prevents said disease and _viola_ , he is immune.”

“That’s remarkable,” your eyes shone at the results. You looked at the chart to the side and even the numbers showed ideal results. “And you get every genetic sequencing right on the first time, that’s impressive, professor.”

“Thank you, (Y/N). I hope one day my findings can be used for the betterment of the human race,” he says. “If only the use of human subjects wasn’t so controversial, if not for that I would’ve made breakthroughs,” he laughed. Although you couldn’t stop the strange feeling you had from moving to the forefront of his thoughts.

“Professor!” A familiar voice shook you and you turned around, making immediate eye contact with someone who you _knew_ wasn’t supposed to be there, and you could tell that he didn’t expect you either.

“If it isn’t our newest recruit, (Y/N), meet Youngheum. Youngheum, this is my star student Lee (Y/N).” You reached your hand out to shake his and he took it.

“It’s so nice to meet you, Youngheum,” you nodded at him and he nodded back. Did you want to know why Ten was here acting as a student? _Yes_. Were you going to ask? _No_.

“Now, what did you need?” Your professor asks.

“There’s a disparity in the data and we need you to check it before we can go on.” Ten sounded like a natural, as if he had been a student since day one.

“Oh right, (Y/N) you can wait in my office.”

“Actually! I think they’d _love_ to see some of the work in action,” Ten pressed. You made eye contact with him again, and the look in his eyes told you to go along with what he was saying.

“He’s right! Your research is very fascinating, sir, I would like to see what is done in this lab myself,” you nod. You notice the way your professors lips twitched downwards for a second before he nodded.

“Alright then, follow us,” he gestured for Ten to take them to his station and, to say the least, you were _very_ excited to see what bull shit Ten pulls to make it look like he understood what was going on.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to everyone in the lab except for Ten, Professor Shin’s office was in shambles.

“What do you mean you can’t find it?!” Baekhyun half whispered/half yelled at the genius hacker.

“I mean it’s not here, which makes sense considering it’s a school property, old as _fuck_ computer,” Taeyong angrily gestures the computer.

“And you can’t pull any cool hacker things to access his home computer?” Jongin opens one of the filing cabinets and runs through all the files in there for any info.

“Not on this piece of garbage,” Taeyong knocks on the boxy out-of-this-time computer. “Let me try on my own laptop…” he pulls out said device from his backpack and hooks it up to the antiquated computer, watching files download onto his own hard drive. Mark runs into the office, with nothing but panic written on his face.

“Hey, remember when we were like ‘(Y/N) can’t know about this mission or else something bad might happen.’?”

“Yes?” The three members looked up at Mark with concerned glances.

“Yeah um… guess who’s talking to both Ten and K83.”

“You’re lying, tell me you’re lying right now,” Baekhyun turned around fully now.

“No, I just heard from Taemin.”

“ _Fuck_.”

Likewise, actually in the whole other side of Dongdaemun-gu, Lucas listened to the other representatives speak above each other, all arguing about how the should handle the sudden rise of a new gang located in Seoul, he didn’t catch the name since he wasn’t actually paying attention, none of this applied to him, after all, it would be the Dream branch that would have to deal with it after all. He was just drumming his fingers on the meeting table when he had this inexplicable chill fill his body, it felt like all of his senses were heightened all at once, and he could feel his heart rate rising. He looked to the clock, seeing that there was still a hefty hour left in this meeting, and he couldn’t risk leaving halfway through. But the thought haunted his mind, it ran back and forth and it put him on edge enough for it to seem like it was written on his face.

_You were in trouble, and if you weren’t now, you were about to be._

~

“Ah, I see the problem,” your Professor looks over Ten’s work again. “You’re missing an important indicator here to show when the reaction is finished. (Y/N), be a dear and get the starch indicator from the storage room.”

“Right away, professor,” you bow your head before leaving. You walk out into the hallway and place your hands in your labcoat pockets, reading the many numbers and plaques on the doors, before finally coming to a stop in front of the storage room. You opened the door and walked in, looking at the many lines and rows of shelves stocked comfortably with various substances. You walked to the back of the room where the indicators were located and looked through until you found the bottle for the starch indicators. “Perfect,” you take it from the shelf and turned to leave, when you suddenly heard scratching. You stopped in your tracks, listening closer, and the scratches got louder. You walked slower this time, trying to pinpoint where the scratching was coming from, but each time you walked too far up or down the aisle, it would just grow quieter. You stood at where the scratching was loudest and found yourself staring at one of the rows of shelves filled with, now it just _had_ to be these, glass test tubes. And to make things worse, the scratching sound was definitely coming from underneath the fixture.

Time to put all of those escape room experiences to good use.

You ran your hands along the wooden shelf, looking for indents or any things that seemed out of place, after finding none, your hands moved to the glass fixtures that rested atop the shelves, moving them slightly across the surface or even moving some of the test tubes to and fro in their respective holders. The sudden sound of a crash caused you to jump slightly and press on the shelf and, to your surprise, you heard a soft click, and the shelf pushed apart, showing a trap door beneath it.

“Please just be a rat who came into contact with an extremely radioactive substance,” you hurriedly whispered to yourself. You rested your hand on the handle and pulled it open, once again jumping at the sudden sound of something crashing. You looked into the darkness that was beneath the trapdoor, there was no light whatsoever. “What’s this really bad feeling I have?” The door opened behind you.

“(Y/N), did you need help-” your Professor stopped talking mid-sentence when he found you standing before the trapdoor. “Ah, what a shame.” He took a few steps forward and, before you could even react, you were pushed down the trapdoor. All you saw was your Professor’s sneering face before the trapdoor closed, leaving you in the darkness.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Gore, Unsettling Themes, Violence, Language

_“There has been an emergency in the lab building,”_ K83 spoke into the PA system, _“please find your way out of the building in an orderly fashion.”_

Baekhyun and the others looked up at the speaker from their spot in another area, deciding to seek refuge in an empty lab room as opposed to the target’s office to complete their business with the files before they finally kill the guy. However, upon hearing the impromptu announcement, they were mildly surprised.

“At least (Y/N) is out of the building,” Taemin hums, staring at the rows of test tubes. Two seconds later, Lucas busts through the door, ripping his tie off and pulling his gun out.

“Where’s (Y/N)?!”

“Lucas, relax, they’re out,” Jongin affirms.

“Can you promise me that?” Lucas leans against the doorframe, catching his breath. Jongin is silent for a moment. It’s not unknown to the senior that Lucas had a weird knack for knowing when (Y/N) was in trouble, it was his sixth sense, the group had mutually agreed. So although there was a nagging voice at the back of Jongin’s head that yelled _“(Y/N) is not okay”_ he ignored it.

“Yeah,” he nods his head. “You heard the announcement, (Y/N)’s smart, they wouldn’t stay here if they knew it wasn’t safe. Fighting off people is understandable, but this is an actual lab accident, and they’re not dumb enough to stay,” he rationalized.

“Right, you’re right,” Lucas answered, but it was obvious to tell that he was still skeptical. He entered the room and closed the door behind him. He sent a text to you for confirmation, though, then turned his phone off. “Did we get the target?”

“Taeyong’s hooking his laptop up to the cameras as we speak, we’re just going through the plan again to make sure we have everything mapped out,” Ten explains.

“What’s the strategy, Ten?” Baekhyun turned to the head strategist.

“Same as last time,” Ten frowns. “We’ll leave Lucas on perimeter, can’t have emergency responders on our backs, Taeyong and I will stay behind to work on support alongside dissecting these files. Taemin, Baekhyun, and Kai will go locate K83 and deal with him now before he leaves, and Mark…”

“Yeah?”

“Make sure Lucas doesn’t get himself killed.”

“So what I usually do, okay,” Mark pulls off his jacket and places it over one of the lab stools.

“Let’s do out best, team,” Baekhyun nods his head.

“It can’t be as bad as the casino, I doubt there’d be another opposing unit here,” Jongin affirms.

“Don’t jinx it, Jongin,” Taemin huffs. With a quick silent agreement amongst the group, they broke off and got to work on their respective jobs.

The empty lab room was left in silence while the two remaining members started their tasks, having full faith in the other members of their team to allow this plan to move smoothly. Taeyong switched programs on his laptop and hooked it up to one of the sockets in the lab room. Ten, on the other hand, started going through the various files that they had pulled out of K83’s office.

“Tell me again why I need to go through these?”

“Assignment #2, get the data that K83 was working on and send it to our labs,” Taeyong answered monotonously, still setting up his laptop to the wall.

“What are you even doing?”

“Praying that my laptop will be able to handle the three programs I have to run. Security cameras, emergency bypasses, and trying to get into the lab’s database.”

“Didn’t you build that laptop yourself?”

“Why do you think I’m worried?” Taeyong glanced back at Ten before he got back to work on his laptop. “I built this thing with the only purpose of running emergency bypasses, since that’s usually what I do when I’m on the field. I just hope this thing doesn’t short circuit on me,” he shakes his head. Ten doesn’t answer, instead, he opens the first file from a stack of twenty.

Assignment #2 was one that was specifically assigned to Ten and Taeyong, and when the two mentioned it to Baekhyun, he helped them find a proper window of time during the mission to let them go through K83’s files, hence why a majority of them were in the office while Taemin and Mark were scoping the target and his actions. To put it into simple terms, Assignment #2 went more into detail about K83’s research, but none of that rat bullshit, the more _interesting_ side of his research. Recall that K83 is an adoptive father, he would _never_ get human experimenting to pass, regardless of the intent, and thus he turned to a more taboo form of finding subjects. By keeping this practice under wraps, K83 has been deemed a Genetic Research Powerhouse, who’s math and results were perfect every time. K83’s research, in particular, works in hopes of creating a genetically perfect species. Perfect eyesight, optimized strength, enhanced hearing, critical problem solving, and amplified speed. All five of those were pulled out of his experimental abstract that was heralded across the world of science.

Sounds familiar?

It should.

K83, Shin Yoon Bum, is being targeted by the mafia for two reasons: Debt and Theft. The debt was explained prior, but for purposes of reminding, it will be explained again. K83 had taken out multiple loans from the mafia, from the bare bones of his transaction history, it was listed as paying certain laboratory bills (i.e. lab equipment, chemicals, living subjects, etc.), but with the usual thoroughness of Lee Taeyong, it was revealed that the specific lab that K83 had been using the funds for was to further his research into the “perfect species,” where did he get that idea from? To answer this, we must backtrack to about eight years before.

Lee Soo Man took on an _interesting_ investment, to create a genetically enhanced team that would be able to handle the oncoming new gangs that were gaining momentum in the Seoul area, namely the group VIXX, which had suddenly begun gaining momentum just a few months prior, and now BTS, who were already on track for controlling the whole of Seoul within a year. Twelve subjects were taken from the streets, each looking for work, each looking for help. These twelve agreed to take part in this experiment, not knowing the malignant repercussions that would result in their participation, the only thing on their mind was the need for something as simple as a job.

TL;DR, these twelve were signed on to the EXO project.

However, especially in the case of Park Chanyeol (E-8), the project went wrong in more ways than one. In Chanyeol’s case, the last to go through the experiment, the lab exploded. It burst into a shockingly beautiful array of hellfire, and the rest of the EXO subjects watched in a strange sense of awestricken shock. Chanyeol had walked out, still alive and half charred, but to the knowledge of the mafia, every scientist had died, and three members had disappeared.

The lab was burned to ash, but a sliver of hope remained. A small file had survived the explosion, one that detailed only a very _small_ part of the whole experiment, and this file found itself in the hands of this corrupted scientist. All that the file had was the beginning of the process of how to splice certain genes into a human genome, and that’s all he needed to begin his horrific trek to advancement.

“God, how old are these?” Ten brushes off the dust on one of the papers with his hand. Taeyong leaned over the table to look at the file.

“Ten, that was from a year ago.”

“Old,” Ten rolled his eyes, but upon reading it, they widened. “Actually…”

“What?”

“I think I’ve got something.”

~

 _“Are you in position?”_ Taemin spoke quietly. His voice would echo across through the air vents, ricocheting off the metal walls.

“Yeah, Jongin sat comfortably in the target’s chair back in the office, fiddling around with the old man’s computer absentmindedly.

 _“What… what are you doing? What’s that typing I hear?”_ Taemin asks.

“I’m just fucking around on his computer,” Jongin laughs. “Maybe I should download some porn on this to make his image look even worse.”

 _“I mean, what’s stopping you?”_ Baekhyun’s amused voice spoke in the other earpiece.

“True,” Jongin pulls up PornHub and starts downloading random videos he sees. “Where’s he at, Baekhyun?”

 _“Well, not in his lab, that’s for sure,”_ Baekhyun says.

 _“Maybe walk around a bit?”_ Taemin offers.

_“What? What is it that you think I’m doing?”_

_“Playing with the rats.”_

_“How did you know?”_ Baekhyun coos. _“They’re so cute.”_

_“That’s disgusting, you don’t know what they’ve been subject to.”_

“We should’ve chosen a different leader,” Jongin leans back on the chair and covers his face. The computer emits a soft ping sound, and Jongin leans forward again, staring at the notification that appeared on the top corner.

_‘Soundswitch flipped in B-2, would you like to check the camera?’_

~

When was the last time you could say that you were afraid?

It was four years ago in Warehouse #3, actually.

You weren’t quite at that level of fear yet though, being left in the black darkness under the trapdoor. You pulled your phone out to send a text to one of the boys but, of course, no signal. Makes sense, the lab was already built to keep signals out so it wouldn’t interfere with some of the devices, and now you were below ground level, even more so.

But, right behind you, the scratching noise was at its loudest. You felt every hair stand on your neck as you felt whatever it was get close to you. It was no lab rat, that much was certain, it was too large. You heard its breathing get heavier as it neared you, and you ceased your own breaths, trying to figure out whether or not you should turn around and beat the shit out of whatever it was that was behind you. Finally, it stood right behind you, you didn’t need to turn, you didn’t want to, instead, you focused on your glowing phone screen, staring at the last message you sent out to Lucas and Mark when you initially arrived.

“Light…” the voice behind you murmured.

Holy shit, this was a person behind you. You still debated on turning around, but you figured, you could defend yourself if something went down, so you turned, the light of the phone illuminating yours and his face. The two of you stared at each other for a moment, your heart had almost completely stopped beating from the pure suspense of this whole exchange. Is it safe to say that you were mildly terrified? Just a bit. This person in front of you looked like he hadn’t seen the light of day in years, no not just that, he looked plain sickly, but he stared at you with so much curiosity in his eyes you didn’t want to pull away from the strange stare down.

“Who are you?” You asked slowly, still holding the phone up.

“Who are… you?” He looked confused. You put your hand on your chest.

“My name is Lee (Y/N),” you said slowly, and he nodded, putting his own hand to his chest.

“My name is Lee (Y/N),” he repeated after you and you shook your head.

“No, not quite, that’s my name, what is yours?” You asked again.

“Me?”

“Mmhmm,” you nodded your head slowly, you didn’t know what to expect from him. But he did look younger than you, maybe only a few years.

“Minjae…” he murmurs. He stared at you for a moment, then looked down at your phone.

“Oh, do you like this?” You waved it carefully and his eyes followed it. He held his hands out, as if asking if he could hold it. You thought for a moment before placing it delicately in his hands.

“Light,” he repeated.

“Yeah, that’s right,” you said softly. He had an amazed smile on his face, but all he was doing was staring at it. “Were you the one scratching on that door?” You pointed up. His eyes followed your hand to the door and he nodded, pointing up as well.

“Light… is there,” he says. “We wanted to go… there.”

“ _We_?” You were suddenly very conscious of the darkness surrounding you.

“Brothers,” he says. You take the phone from his hands, not in a threatening way, more as a curious way, there’s no way that there isn’t a form of light source down here, you assume. So you turn the flashlight on, Minjae scrambled away from the sudden flash of light when you held it up, but the way you gasped was loud enough for him to shudder.

At the moment, you stood in a large room, such was obvious, it was about the size of two standard classrooms put together, and, as expected, there were various lab tech surrounding the room. To be honest, it looked like a twisted version of the lab you just came from.

But back to the reason why it was nearly horrifying, ignoring the dead body in the corner, there were four other pairs of eyes, each huddled together in a corner away from you. You stepped over the dried blood puddles and approached what looked like the light switch, but once you turned it on, Minjae ran up and shut it off. You turned to the other boys, who were covering their ears.

“Bad,” he shook his head. One of the other boys came up to you, albeit suspiciously.

“How did you get down here?” He spoke better than the first.

“Uh… I was shoved down… by my professor,” you explained. He played with the hem of his tattered shirt.

“So you’re… one of us?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Sibling?” He tilted his head to the side. You thought for a moment, and you pointed up again.

“Is my professor your father?” You asked. You vaguely recalled your professor saying that he adopted orphans.

“Shin Yoon Bum?”

“Yeah, that’s his name.”

“Then yes, he is our father,” he says. “I’m Seongjun, and now I’m the oldest,” he says.

“Now?” He points to the dead body in the corner. “Oh.”

“There were others before too, but not anymore. It’s just us five now,” Seongjun explains. “Well, I should really rephrase it as we’re the only ones who survived.”

“Pardon?”

“You have no idea what our father does, do you?” Seongjun looked surprised. “Have you read his abstract?”

“The perfect human.”

“Well, that’s pretty much what we were supposed to be, our older brother there was supposedly the perfect human but… you see where that got him,” he shrugs, “so instead each of us just has one trait,” he explains. You looked amongst the five of them, who were slowly inching towards you the more they deemed you safe to be around. This wasn’t the strangest situation you’ve been in, that’s for sure, but it certainly isn’t one you would’ve expected at all.

“Critical problem solving,” you pointed at Seongjun.

“Yup,” he points at Minjae, who was just behind you, “Minjae’s perfect eyesight, Seungmin’s optimized strength, Huijun’s amplified speed, and Junhyuck’s enhanced hearing.”

“Oh, interesting,” you did your best to memorize names and faces. “If you don’t mind me asking… how long have you all been down here?”

“It’s no problem,” Seongjun shrugs. “I’m the newest one. Been about two or three months? Minjae’s been here the longest, though, ten years almost. And the rest of them fall in between. Sucks that you’re stuck down here too.”

“You look about my age, though, I thought that the orphan adoption cut off is at 18?”

“Is it? Huh. I’m supposed to be the smart one and I still can’t figure that out,” Seongjun says. “Should probably mention that his actual name isn’t Shin Yoon Bum, now that I brought it up.”

“Huh?”

“Yeah, he had to change it because of what he called ‘complications.’ It’s Son, Son Beomsoo.”

You felt a sudden sharp pain in your head, and you brought your hand up to your now pounding temporals. You took a step back to steady yourself, you recognized that name, you know you do, but why can’t you remember where it’s from? The way your head suddenly started spinning, the way your heart started pumping, you _knew_ that name, but from where?

“(Y/N)?” Seongjun takes a step forward, reaching out to calm you down, but you flinch away. “You’re about to have a panic attack, you need to calm down.”

“Wait,” you search your memories, trying to piece two and two together, but none came, just more confusion.

 _Beomsoo_.

You know that name, this isn’t the first you’ve heard it, you’re certain, but where else could it have been from?

 _“There has been an emergency in the lab building,”_ you heard the PA system above you, _“please find your way out of the building in an orderly fashion.”_

You’re pulled out of your panic when the trapdoor opens again and a ladder descends from it. Seongjun pushes you behind him right as you heard Beomsoo remove the safety lock of a gun.

“Oh, you’re still alive,” Beomsoo snarled. “Seongjun, step away,” he orders. You spot Minjae behind him, slowly inching closer to your professor, there was something in his hands, but you couldn’t see it in the dark.

“Sorry, I can’t do that,” Seongjun hid his hand behind his back, beckoning someone forward.

You’re at least smart enough to know they had been planning something. But you’re definitely clever enough to know it’s not going to work.

You scanned the area, it was obvious, the boys were using the dark to incapacitate Beomsoo, admirable, really, but expected. You did a quick rundown of the outcomes, if they continue the way that they are there was a high chance one or more of these boys would get killed. Your eyes drifted to the glass on the floor, then you spotted Huijun rearranging some of them silently. Now this was interesting, setting up an un-level playing field, so to say, as long as the boys knew where the glass shards were located, they were in the upper hand. But that wouldn’t work either, at most Beomsoo would be fine stepping on them given the hard-sole shoes he was wearing.

Did you mention the gun yet? That was the biggest variable. Now you looked down to the handgun in Beomsoo’s hand, it was small and had a muffler on it, which made sense given that you were beneath a college campus at the moment. but one great thing about mufflers is that they reduce the accuracy when firing, they’re only good when shooting at point-blank, and with how he had been acting so far, Beomsoo’s too careful to take it off and fire openly. If you just waited for the right timing, you could step in front of Seongjun and unarm the old man easily and turn it on him.

 _‘Just a few more steps,’_ you thought to yourself. But Beomsoo stopped.

“Boys, you really think the five of you could gang up on me like that?” He flipped the switch next to him and you watched the boys fall to the ground, covering their ears and clenching their jaws, trying their best not to scream. You grabbed the closest thing to you and brandished it. “Test tubes aren’t much of a weapon, Second in Line.”

“Oh you’d be surprised,” you stepped over Junhyuck. “So you _know_ me, then.”

“Know you?” Beomsoo scoffed. “(Y/N), I’m one of the people who helped your grandfather track you down.”

“Definitely not the first,” you broke the test tube in half. “You’re not that special, Professor.”

“You know, that’s what your brother said before I shot him.” Your breath caught in your throat, but you stayed steady. You’re not going to let an old man take advantage of you, fuck that.

“I don’t have a brother,” you affirmed. “I’ve always been an only child.”

“Oh really? Strange, he was very adamant on finding you,” Beomsoo pointed the gun towards you and pulled the trigger, but you moved out of the way easily.

“Not the first to be looking for me either, that tends to happen when you’re next in line for a mafia,” you grabbed onto another nearby tool and threw it. Beomsoo followed the track of the beaker, watching it crash onto the wall next to him. “Fuck.”

“You know, Lee (Y/N), you have quite the bounty on your head to those who know about you. But at the same time, those people are very persistent about keeping your identity under wraps. You are a true enigma.”

“That’s one fucked up compliment,” you came to a halt in front of Seungmin, and Beomsoo stopped steps away from you, still holding up his gun.

“The money I get from turning in your head will be enough to fund my research for years.”

“Tragic.”

 _Bang_.

~

“I think I’ve got something,” Ten leans over the file and re-read the line. “He’s got some information on the EXO members too, this is describing what happened to Chanyeol, I think.”

“Let me see,” Taeyong leaves his laptop and walks over to Ten, reading the file over carefully. Then he pulled out his phone and looked up his file on the EXO unit. “Everything checks out, to the last detail. But there’s no way this information would have been piled with the genome instructions, those alone take up thirty terabytes,” he mumbles.

“Unless…” Ten eyed Taeyong, they both had the same thought.

“He had to have been one of the key researchers,” Taeyong mumbles. “And if that’s true, we need to dispose of him as soon as possible,” he says.

“Yeah, that’s the only way,” Ten shakes his head.

“Have you guys found K83 yet?” Taeyong spoke into the speaker.

 _“No, and we’re starting to think he evacuated already. How are the cameras going?”_ Baekhyun’s voice replied.

“They’re working, but I’ve probably flipped through the cycle thrice and I still can’t find the target. Either he’s hiding in a blind spot or he made it out.”

_“Fuck.”_

“But I highly doubt it. I ran through the footage from all the exits from an hour ago to now and I haven’t seen him in any.”

_“So basically he’s still in the building?”  
_

“Yeah. Come to think of it, there’s a blacked-out camera in the storage room, but it’s encrypted, so I’ve been working on it. The reverse code should be finished soon.”

_“Fill me in on Assignment #2 then.”  
_

“We’ve made a lot of progress if that helps. I’ll turn it over to Ten,” Taeyong turned to the other man and nodded his head. Ten tapped on his earpiece to power it on.

“Do you hear me, Baek?”

_“Loud and clear.”_

“Good. It took some digging through these files and a lot of work into one of these old as hell computers, but we found the experimental files.”

_“Really? What do they include?”  
_

“A lot of nonsense, really, but we’ve found a lot of data that correlates to the EXO project.”

_“… Tell me more.”  
_

“Well, we have Chanyeol’s report in full detail, as well as Kyungsoo’s, Sehun’s, and Jongdae’s. I’m pretty sure if I do more digging I’ll find the rest.”

_“Keep those files and bring them back to the Bunker.”  
_

“Yes, sir. Good luck with K83.” Ten heard the other line fall dead and figured that Baekhyun had hung up.

~

Baekhyun continued to walk down the pristine halls of the lab building, checking every corner and under every stairwell.

“Where are you, you son of a bitch,” he mumbles. He hasn’t forgotten him, no way. He really thought he could erase his history by changing his name? Baekhyun recognized him the _moment_ Taeyong showed him on the screen, and no doubt Jongin did too. After all, how could anyone forget the man who _ruined_ them? Baekhyun remembered every experiment to the smallest detail, how sharp the needles were, how long the anesthetics lasted until he would wake up mid-surgery, even what color the radiation he was forced to interact with was. And every time he would look up, it was the same face. Son Beomsoo, the associate scientist at the time to the head scientist. It was always him who carried out the experiments while the head scientist would lounge away in his office.

To say that Baekhyun had a problem with him would be an understatement. The joy he felt when Chanyeol blew up the lab and all the data in it, the joy he felt when he watched Kyungsoo overpower the researchers, the joy he felt when he watched their world fall apart. It was better than ecstasy. And now he has the perfect opportunity to enact his eight-year revenge plan. To stage a finale to the EXO project, and finally be at peace for at least one thing.

 _“Baek,”_ Jongin’s voice was clear.

“Yeah?”

_“When you find him, don’t forget to ask him the question.”_

“Right,” Baekhyun spun the gun in his hands. “That question.”

_“We just need to know where they are.”_

“I know, I know,” Baekhyun nodded to himself. Kris, Luhan, and Tao, the three members who were lost during the experiments. Jongin was originally tasked with finding them before Chanyeol blew the lab up, but after nine too many jumps, Yixing ended up having to pull him out of the lab before it went up in the flames. Beomsoo had to know where they are, he’s the one who took them. Baekhyun walked up what had to be the fifth stairwell and looked out the window. It was dark outside, how long had they been in here? How long have they been looking for Beomsoo? Baekhyun couldn’t help but think that it was more than just petty theft that finally prompted Lee Soo Man to tell them to get rid of the guy, that finally forced Lee Soo Man to provide them the materials to dispose of him properly. What else did he do? Baekhyun looked up, the floor above him was the roof. He heard two voices up there but didn’t recognize any of them to belong to K83, if anything, they sounded more like students. Probably two who evacuated to the roof instead of to the streets, he figured.

~

Taeyong walks back to his laptop and pulls up the security cam feed, eyeing the pitch black one at the corner of his screen that had a lock on it.

“Hello, K83,” he clicks on it and watched the series of codes run across the window.

“Found him?”

“Think so, why else would this camera be encrypted?” he mumbles. “Hold on, I think I’ve got the audio,” he presses a few keys and turns his volume up.

 _“Second in line…”_ the voice was garbled, but Taeyong easily recognized it to belong to K83, and a small smirk rose on his face. But as quickly as it rose, an unsettling feeling replaced it. A loud shatter was heard and the mic picked up on the static, rendering a majority of the conversation muddled. But once it cleared, only one word was heard.

 _“Tragic.”_ Then static again.

“Haha, that sounds like (Y/N),” Ten chuckled from his seat. Taeyong completes the reverse code and the camera reveals the sight.

“Call Lucas.”

~

“Long time no see,” Seungmin watched the older boy close the door to the roof behind him. He waved at him while he walked over. “How’ve you been?”

“Cut the bullshit.”

“You look horrible,” Seungmin had a smile on, but if one were to look hard enough they’d see how twisted it really was. But when the other’s frown only deepened, Seungmin straightened his lips into a straight line and nodded. 

“Why go through the trouble of calling me?”

“Well, you sacrificed so much to find them, right? It’s heartwarming, really! I considered telling you for a while, but it was entertaining to watch you run like a chicken with its head cut off,” Seungmin snickers. The older boy rolled his eyes.

“I should’ve known this wouldn’t have-”

“First-floor storage room. Move the test tube shelf, you’ll find a trap door under it,” Seungmin’s voice was low.

“I know how you work, Seungmin, what do you want in return?”

“Free of charge.”

“Don’t lie, you already told me your end. And you’re the last person I want to be indebted to,” he reasons. Seungmin sighs.

“Just make sure they’re alright. I’ve taken a small liking to them, you know,” Seungmin maintains his light tone, despite the way his guest grimaced. “What can I say, we had a history project together,” he threw his arms up and shrugged in an exaggerated way.

“Sure, Seungmin,” the other rolls his eyes.

“Oh, you might want to be careful, by now the SuperM members are patrolling the building, especially the tall one, I remember that you’ve had problems with him before,” Seungmin whistles.

“Yeah, I just missed N-12.” He turns around and walks to the door, opening it without another word. Seungmin waved at him until he was just about to close the door, then said one sentence.

“Good luck, with N-11 moving around… you’re going to need it.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Shootings, Guns, Violence, Language

“Again,” Siwon’s voice echoed in your ears. You pushed yourself off of the matted floors with a loud groan, only for you to collapse back onto the floor.

“Why do I have to do this? Why can’t I just be a _normal_ person?” You complained. Siwon laughed and grabbed your hand and pulled you up.

“You can’t be normal, little one,” he stretched his arms. “And we can’t leave this room until you get your technique down. What happened? You used to be one of my aces,” he nudged your arm.

“If I have to sit through one more of Leetuk’s lectures I think I might actually lose my mind, Siwon,” you sighed. “When grandfather said I could get an education, I thought he meant to go to an actual high school, not me sitting in my dining room listening to Leetuk talk for _four hours straight_.” You ruffled your already messy hair.

The members of Super Junior were instructed to take on mentor roles for you, seeing as your grandfather would hardly have any time to even pay attention to you, it fell on them to prepare you for your future as the second in line. Of the members, however, you ended up growing closest to Siwon, who was in charge of your physical training. It was him, Leetuk, and Donghae who ended up looking after you more than the other members. Which makes sense, you spent more time with those three than the others. Siwon obviously for physical training, Leetuk was in charge of your studies, and Donghae just made sure you weren’t on the brink of a psychotic breakdown.

“He’s not that bad once you get used to him,” Siwon passed you a bottle of water and you chugged a good half of it down. The door to the training room opened and Donghae walked in.

“Working hard?” He was holding a bag and he placed it on the bench. “Brought lunch for you two, oh, your grandfather wants you, (Y/N).”

“But I’m like… disgusting right now…” you took out one of the tupperwares from the bag. “Does he want me right _now_ right now?”

“Yeah.”

“Ugh,” you slumped on the bench. Siwon handed you a towel. “Fine, I’ll head over there as soon as I can then. Are Lucas and Mark outside?”

“N-11? Nah, he’s out with the WayV unit. And I think N-12 is with Dream right now.”

“Oh, alright,” you chewed the inside of your cheek and stood up. “I’ll head out then. I’ll see you guys tomorrow,” you waved absently while you walked out into the empty corridor. There was something strange about not being followed by either Lucas or Mark. But, you were pleasantly surprised when Johnny turned the corner. “Are you my stand-in for today?”

“Yup,” he jogged up to you and handed you a small box. “That’s from Taeyong, he said you’d like it.” You opened it up and looked at the simple bracelet.

“There’s a tracker in this, isn’t there?”

“Yeah, the boss told him to make it so _please_ just wear it for us,” Johnny frowns. “I don’t think the boss’ll fall for the ‘it broke’ excuse anymore. We had to make that one life-proof basically,” he says.

“Yeah, yeah,” you slipped it on your wrist. The two of you started walking to the office. “I guess I get why he’s so protective, but at the same time I feel like I’m wearing a handcuff.”

“Better than one of these,” Johnny pulled up his pant leg and showed you the large metal clasp over his ankle.

“Do all of you wear those… chunky things?”

“Nah, just me, Yuta, and Jaehyun.”

“Why?”

“We fuck shit up too often,” he flashed a confident smirk and you push him playfully, then the little shit collapsed against the wall and feigned pain. “Ah, so cruel.”

“Ah, it’s always you three,” you laughed and pulled him off the wall. You stopped at the door. “I should probably go in alone this time, huh.”

“Yeah, that’s probably the best choice, I’ll be out here though, so don’t worry.”

“Yup, okay, I’ll be out in a bit,” you entered the office.

You had been in here so many times that you now realized how small the office actually was, it wasn’t as intimidating as you had originally thought it to be, but it was still cold and uninviting. You walked down the dark green rug, hearing the hardwood floors creak underneath it, and came to a stop in front of your grandfather’s desk.

“How have your studies been?” He asked with that same misleading smile.

“Pretty alright,” you answered vaguely.

“That’s good, very good, your last lecture is soon, isn’t it?” He hums. “I was talking to SJ-1 about this, and I’ve thought about this for quite some time now, (Y/N), but of course I have to ask how you feel about this.”

“Yes, grandfather?”

“I was thinking about enrolling you into Seoul University to complete your education.” Your heart leapt a little, finally an excuse to get you out of this damn facility. “Under a few conditions, of course.”

“What are they?”

“You still have to abide by the rules we agreed on. No one can know you’re affiliated with us, you know this, surely.”

“I do.”

“You’re next condition is that you have to keep your grades above a B level. If they drop in your final grades I will pull you out of that institution.”

“I can do that,” you nodded.

“And the final condition is that N-11 and N-12 still have to monitor you even in that institution,” he finishes. You could only nod your head, anything for even a taste of freedom. “With those two with you, I can rest assured that there won’t be any complications. I’ll brief them separately on what they have to do and focus on, but with these conditions I can let you go to this university. Are we in agreement?”

“Yes!” It came out too quickly, and you shrank slightly. “Yes, I am in agreement.”

“Then it’s settled, be aware of what you do, I am certain that there are people who have their eye out for you, my grandchild,” Soo Man nods to himself. “You may go now.”

“Thank you, grandfather, you won’t regret this decision,” you bowed your head to him and left the office. Soo Man watched the large doors close and lock before he turned his head.

“Are you sure this is the best choice of action, SJ-1?”

“Certainly, you can’t expect them to take on your legacy without knowing how the world works, surely,” Leetuk stepped out from behind the bookcase. “But I didn’t see it necessary for me to be hiding from them.”

“SJ-1, I simply wanted you to observe how they reacted. I hope you took notes, this interaction was very telling.”

“I did catch a few things, but those were more on your end, sir.”

“Then you know what I’m going to ask next then.”

“I hope you don’t want my surveillance of them to be 24/7, sir.”

“Of course not, don’t be ridiculous. Just every now and then. And make it random, you’ll never know with them, they could be very creative in getting around my conditions, I’m sure you know. It’s not cheap to pay for all of those trackers they supposedly broke,” Soo Man is only slightly amused. “They’re very clever, my successor, and I’ve always applauded them for that.”

“I’ll make it a point then, sir,” Leetuk bowed his head.

“You are dismissed.”

“Yes, sir.”

~

With every step Lucas took around the building, the sick feeling he had in his stomach only rose. Something was horribly wrong, he just knew it and, for once in his life, he could care less about the sinking amount of debt he was in, he didn’t give a fuck about how much deeper into this prison he’d be in, he’d much rather abandon post to find you as soon as possible. It was written on his face, the worry, the anger, it was so obvious even Mark agreed that they should just look for you. Maybe he was wrong in trusting Jongin’s word, he should’ve just gone off on his own to make sure you were out of the building.

 _“Lucas!”_ Ten’s voice was sharp, catching Lucas off guard.

“No EMRs as far as I can—”

“Meet us in the storage room. We have sights on K83, and he has (Y/N).”

“I fucking knew it!” Lucas abandoned post without another word. “Mark! Pack up, we’ve gotta go _now_!”

“Yeah, Taeyong gave me a heads up, _fuck_ , please be okay, (Y/N),” Mark ran after Lucas without another word. The two boys ran into Taemin and Baekhyun on their way and continued as a unit, kicking down the doors to every storage room they found and looking under the racks for the secret door. But, of course, when has luck ever been on their side?

The four boys ran into another storage room, but this one seemed different from the rest. The lights above them flickered.

“Baekhyun, calm down,” Taemin glared at their leader.

“That’s not me.”

“Then—” Lucas grabbed Taemin by the collar and pushed the whole group to the ground at the sudden flurry of bullets that came their way.

“What the hell?!” Mark ducked behind one of the shelves. “Man, fuck Jongin, everything he’s said has gone the whole opposite way. _Fuck this_!”

“What unit are we dealing with?!” Baekhyun spoke over the gunfire and Taemin looked over one of the shelves, a horrible realization setting on his features. He ducked back down and watched Baekhyun reload his gun and made quick gestures for him to stop.

“Hyun, it’s a kid. We’re getting shot at by a _kid_ ,” he hisses. “Jesus, I think he’s even younger than Jisung.”

“What?” Baekhyun whispered. He looked at the corner mirror of the room and, lo and behold, there was a dark-brown haired teenager perched on top of one of the boxes. He had a lollipop in his mouth and he brandished a machine gun in his hands. But the only thing that mattered to Baekhyun was what he was wearing. It was a school uniform, that much was clear, but on the right arm was an emblem that he knew too well.

“Who is it?” Mark looked at Baekhyun with wide eyes.

“I don’t know.” Baekhyun’s voice was cool, but there was a small hint of worry behind it. “But he’s with BigHit.”

~

“No, no, no, no, _fuck_!” Taeyong hit the monitor of his laptop a few times. “Do not fucking do this to me now, fuck, fuck, no!”

“What happened?! How can I fix it?!” Ten ran over and looked at the static on the laptop’s monitor. “Fuck, talk about timing. I can’t believe it lasted that long without short-circuiting.”

“No, it didn’t short-circuit,” Taeyong growls. “Someone tampered with my server.”

“So what you’re saying is we’re not alone.”

“Nope.”

“Great, just great, who are we dealing with now?” Ten groans. Taeyong shakes his head.

“No clue, I guess I can use that dinosaur over there, but it’ll take me a while to integrate my hard drive onto it. The binaries would take at least fifteen minutes to complete, and that’s on my laptop, who knows how it’ll react on that Dell computer.”

“I didn’t understand a majority of what you said, but just do what you have to do,” Ten slams the files on the table. “I’m heading out to the field, can you handle yourself here?”

“Yeah, ‘course.”

“Alright then, call me if you need backup.”

“Yup,” Taeyong ripped off the panel on the computer and tore out the cable that connected the monitor to its original hard drive, paying no attention to Ten when he slammed the door behind him. He pulled his hard drive out of his laptop and hooked it up to the lab’s computer and watched the codes complete themselves. Then his laptop sparked to life behind him, and he had no other choice but to watch what was going on in the monitor.

 _“So you’re the genius hacker I’ve heard so much about?”_ The voice was heavily modified. _“You don’t look like you’re so talented.”_

“Who are you?” Taeyong spoke with a certain poison laced in his words.

 _“Whoa, why so serious?”_ The voice taunts. _“Just a fellow hacker. Sorry, you’ll have to excuse me, I didn’t think I’d ever meet the famous Lee Taeyong.”_

“Consider yourself unlucky.”

_“So serious! Relax, we’re just here to get what we need and go. But you guys are in the way, so we’ll have to get rid of you first.”_

“Like hell you will.”

_“What do you mean? All we have to do is to make sure they can’t communicate with you. You’re their lifeline, without you behind the scenes, they’re nothing. Now we can pick them off one by one.”_

“And who exactly is ‘ _we_ ’?”

 _“Aren’t you curious,”_ the voice continues to play around. The screen switched back to the security camera window. _“Isn’t he one of yours?”_ Taeyong watched as Ten was tackled to the ground by two hooded figures.

“Shit.”

_“Not so super now, are you?”_

“Who the hell are you?”

 _“The person who was trained to counteract you specifically, Lee Taeyong. It’s kind of interesting actually, both of our names start with Tae, actually, that was random, I’m sorry! I’m panicking, you’re my role model! It sucks that I’ll never meet you in person. You seven don’t even stand a chance,”_ the unknown hacker laughed. _“We haven’t even pulled our Ace card, yet.”_

“Well good luck with that,” Taeyong turns and pays the screen no mind, until a certain phrase.

 _“Tragic.”_ Taeyong whipped his head around right on time to see you on the screen. You were at a staredown with K83, and you had both of your hands in the air. Then he watched K83 pull the trigger.

~

“I will not get shot up by a _kid_ ,” Taemin hisses. Baekhyun throws his arm in front of the other member.

“Let’s not be rash, maybe we can talk to him.” A bullet finds it’s way right next to Baekhyun and he shuts up. “Just kidding. I’m gonna fucking kill that kid.” Mark looks between the two seniors with a slight fear. Mark had seen enough people get killed this week, he didn’t want to add someone who was younger than him to the death toll, that’s not something he wanted to do _at all_. He looked over at Lucas, who was just itching to make a mad dash for the door, but that’s _definitely_ not a good idea. Taemin was already aiming his gun, but with their assaulter that high up there’s no way Taemin could take a clear shot from where they were hiding. Now Baekhyun, he was planning something, going over the possibilities and endgames. Mark pulled his phone out and, of course, not a single notification. What the hell was Taeyong doing?

“How about we _don’t_ do that and we bolt to find (Y/N)? Sounds like a good plan, we should do that,” Mark nods his head.

“Look I don’t wanna do this either but there’s something important we have to do,” the boy speaks up. “Just make this easier for us please.”

“Like hell we’ll do that!” Lucas barks.

“You know, you’re all talk, your friend is dying you know… all alone in a basement, they must be so scared, and look at you? You’re up here sitting behind a shelf, it’s pathetic,” a darker tone falls over the boy and Mark had to tie Lucas’ shoelaces together so that he wouldn’t burst out of their hiding spot and strangle him.

“Lucas, chill, he’s just trying to rile you up, we have to think about this logically.”

“Come down here and fight me you son of a bitch!” Lucas shot a bullet into the ceiling.

“Lucas, relax!” Baekhyun ordered. The leader hit the side of his phone. “Fuck, are all the channels jammed? What the hell…” Baekhyun pushed it back in his pocket and reloaded his pistol.

“As soon as we leave this shelf we will _die_. How about we wait?” Taemin glances behind him to look at the boy sitting on top of the boxes. He held the assault rifle like it was a toy, it was so natural in his hands it almost sickened him, but at the same time it looked like he didn’t want to be here. At most, he was perched on top of those boxes because he had to be. They could probably use that to their advantage if anything.

“Heard anything from Taeyong?”

“Not even a cough,” Lucas shakes his head. He looks over at the door.

“You’re not going to…” Mark shakes his head. Lucas pulls Mark’s gun out of his holster and hands it to him.

“Cover me.”

“I fucking hate you,” Mark shook his head and grabbed a metal tray from the shelf behind him. He dives in front of Lucas, holding the tray up to shield the both of them.

“Jesus you’re both lunatics!” Baekhyun waved his hand in the air and cut the lights. “Taemin grab the kid!”

Taemin and Baekhyun stayed low to the floor, with bullets whizzing above them, any wrong move now and that’s it for them. They heard the door open and close and figured that Mark and Lucas made it out. Baekhyun waved his hand in the air again and the lights flickered back on. The younger boy stood up now, staring at the door with a bewildered look.

“Great, they pissed off the brat,” Taemin groaned. “What’s our plan of attack?” Baekhyun doesn’t respond. Taemin turned to his side, only to see that Baekhyun wasn’t even there. He looks over to the box and watches Baekhyun knock the kid off, effectively disarming and restraining him. He tosses him against a wall and crouches down. The younger boy struggled for only a few moments before he realized he was fucked.

“Bang PD is gonna kill me,” his face falls from a scowl to one of fear.

“Well, if you wanna live to see it, you’re going to tell us everything, alright…” Baekhyun pushes the black cloak away from the boy’s chest. “Huening Kai?” He raises an eyebrow and Huening frowns.

~

“What the fuck?!” Ten rolled into a lab room and hid behind one of the lab stations. One of the hooded figures followed him in, the other darting down the hallway, holding the flashlight up and looking around the dark lab. Ten held a hand to his wound, a poor attempt to stop the bleeding, he would have to deal with it later, he figured. He tapped his earpiece, but ripped it out as soon as it shocked him. He watched the small device spark on the floor. Well, there goes any hope of backup.

“God, I don’t want to do this,” the hooded figure said above him. Ten looked up and drew his gun, shooting the figure’s hip before he ran out of the room.

“Shit,” Ten ran down the halls. He was working solo for now, no connection with the others, _great_.

“Oh, hey,” a blonde haired student held his hand up. “Have you seen the pro—”

“What the hell are you doing here?! We need to evacuate!” Ten stepped back into his acting role.

“We? What’s going on?”

“The lab’s getting _shot up_ that’s what’s wrong!” Ten dashed past the student, expecting him to follow, but he did no such thing.

“Huh, you guys are even weaker than the boss told us, it’s kind of pathetic,” the student didn’t turn around, he continued staring down the opposite hallway. “SuperM, huh? Jungkook told us about you guys, but you aren’t as badass as he made you guys out to be.”

“So you’re with BigHit then?”

“Yup,” the student turns on his heels and walks over to Ten. “Hey, let’s make a deal.”

“What kind of deal?” Ten dropped the facade, there was no point.

“Me and the other four are looking for something… important. We were instructed to bring _them_ back unharmed,” he says. “See, I’d introduce myself but that’s kind of against the rules, you know. Look, Ten, we just need (Y/N) and we’ll be out of your hair. Promise we won’t do anything to them! I like them a lot, they helped me with my lab,” the student had a smug grin on his face. Ten’s hand moved to his gun.

“Oh yeah, you shot Soobin. Low blow, poor guy didn’t even wanna be here. What? Are you going to shoot me too? I’m just a poor student.”

“Poor student my ass, who the hell are you?”

“Just an Ace is all.”

~

“Bingo,” Jongin shoved the shelf aside, staring at the trap door below. He tapped onto his earpiece, listening for Taeyong’s answer, but none came. “Taeyong? Taeyong!” Jongin called multiple times, but still no response. Jongin looked at the door, debating on whether or not he should go check up on his teammate, but then he looked at the trap door, he couldn’t forget what he saw on that busted computer, he had to go in now, before it was too late for you. If he knew that it was _Beomsoo_ they were dealing with he would’ve taken extra precautions to keep you away, he couldn’t risk you unearthing something you weren’t supposed to see. Jongin pulled open the trap door and jumped to the bottom, scavenging the area carefully. The lab was, understandably, a mess, and with the events that happened before his eyes a few moments earlier, he’d expect no less. Then, he noticed a slight movement at the corner of his eye, and he drew his gun without a second thought, ready to shoot. The boy fell to the floor and cowered, hiding his face behind his hands, and Jongin relaxed.

“Hey there,” Jongin approached him slowly, racking through his brain and trying to remember the name of the boy. He had only briefly gone over the files he had found in the office. Jongin noted the pistol in Minjae’s hands. “Minjae, right?”

“Mmhmm.”

“Okay, hey. Hi,” Jongin tried to speak slowly so as to keep the boy calm. If he was anything like him, or the rest of the EXO unit for that matter, then he had to tread carefully. “I’m Jongin.”

“E-8?”

“Yeah, that’s me,” Jongin holstered his gun and held his hand out to the younger boy, and the other hesitated before taking it. Jongin pulled him up slowly. “I’m looking for someone named (Y/N). Do you know where they are?” It was then when Minjae broke into tears and Jongin started panicking, he rushed to comfort the boy, but he had to be honest, he didn’t know if it was for him or for Minjae.

“(Y/N)…” Minjae hiccuped. “They’re over here,” Minjae led Jongin into the back room, and Jongin reacted quickly, pushing the other four boys off of you and shaking you roughly. You definitely weren’t in the best condition, and the bandaging job around your abdomen wasn’t ideal, but it was sufficient. Your breaths were labored, and your face was contorted in pain, but you were alive.

“Hey, relax, bud,” Seongjun frowns. “We stabilized them.”

“Fucking hell…” Jongin curses. He taps his earpiece again, hoping for a reply.

“Trust us, that’s not worth it,” Seongjun sighs. “No doubt TXT has infiltrated already,” he says.

“TXT?”

“You haven’t heard?”

“And you have?”

“They’re our father’s project _before_ us,” Seongjun explains.

“Top secret,” Huijun presses a finger to his lips while he applied light pressure on your wound. “But when BigHit came to collect, father wasn’t very pleased. So he kept working on us as his lab rats, but you could only manipulate genes so much before it becomes too much,” Huijun shrugs.

“Look, I’d love to fill you in bud, but you’ve gotta get them out, _now_ ,” Seongjun insists. Jongin presses his lips together. He probably had enough energy for two jumps. One to get you somewhere secure, and one to come back and finish the mission. “If you make it back in one piece, we’re willing to help.”

“What do I have to do on my end?”

“ _Kill Beomsoo_.” Seongjun said it in a hushed voice, and when Jongin looked around at the other four boys, he could easily tell that they shared the same sentiment, and he couldn’t blame them.

“Done.”

“Be careful, when you try to jump the one with black hair will try to stop you,” Seungmin cuts in.

“Alright, I’ll be on the look out for him,” Jongin picked you up with ease. “I’ll try to send Baekhyun your way.”

“Okay,” Seongjun nods. Minjae walked up to Jongin and placed the pistol on top of you.

“Need… that…” Minjae mumbled. Jongin bit his tongue back, not wanting to overstep his boundaries, then he readied himself. He had a clear destination in mind, and he had no clue what would result when he landed there, but he didn’t have a choice. He took a deep breath in and, after a running start, teleported to the only place he could think of.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Shootings, Guns, Violence, Language

“Alright, spit it out,” Baekhyun loomed over the boy easily. He crossed his arms and waited for an answer. Against their better judgment, Baekhyun and Taemin opted to knock the kid out and tie him up to get their answers. They needed to know how BigHit knew they’d be there, they needed to know who these kids were, and, maybe most of all, they needed to know what they wanted. By the time the kid woke up, which would’ve been about ten minutes after the fact, they had already decided what they were going to ask.

“I’m not telling you guys anything,” Huening grits his teeth. Baekhyun and Taemin share quick glances. Taemin rolled his eyes and fired a shot right next to Huening, to which the younger boy flinched.

“I’ve killed people _much_ younger than you, don’t try me,” Taemin hisses. He held the gun in his hand loosely, it was something he had grown accustomed to having on his person at all times, at most, it is what a pen is to a writer at this point. But this revolver, in particular, was different. You could call it a lucky item of his, with this revolver he’s never missed his shot, and he intends to use it if necessary.

“What did you do with the communication signals?”

“Oh, that was Taehyun…” Huening explains, eyeing the gun that was kept trained on him. “It’s just a blocker, nothing serious.”

“What’s your unit?”

“I can’t tell you that—” Taemin cut the boy off by clearing his throat. “TXT…”

“And who are you?”

“I’m Huening Kai.”

“Go on.”

“I’m a scouter for BigHit, okay? Geez, relax with that gun, you’re giving me anxiety,” he shudders. Taemin just loads the bullet in place. Huening looks between the two nervously, before he settles his sights on Baekhyun.

“It must have sucked, huh?” He asks. Baekhyun crossed his arms and didn’t answer. “I wonder, what did he do to you? Did it hurt?”

Baekhyun felt his heart pounding in his ears, he couldn’t figure out why though, he kept a steady stare on Huening, listening to every word but, for whatever reason, choosing not to answer. Just, simply, _internalizing_. He didn’t even know why he was starting to get pissed, he didn’t even know why whatever this kid was doing was working, but he didn’t care. The moment he steps out of line, Baekhyun wouldn’t hesitate. He knew exactly what he was talking about, and it’s an event that Baekhyun never forgot about, nor would he ever.

“He had long perfected the process by the time he got to us, but you were his firsts, weren’t you? The needles, he told us, used to be 14 gauged, right? How many did he use? Did they hurt? I heard they ran out of anesthetics at one point, but they couldn’t order more or else it would expose the whole experiment. I’ve always wondered how you could get superpowers, I never knew they were so _painful_. Who knew, right? My teammates and I read the modus operandi for every single one of you and, let me just say, the fact that you survived a lobotomy? That’s crazy, and the electroshock treatments that finally gave you your powers? Genius, brilliant, I almost want to try it myself but the boss won’t let me.”

“I don’t know what you’re doing, but it’s not going to work,” Baekhyun cuts into Huening’s words, but the younger didn’t relent.

“You know, he showed us the videos, hoping that we could figure out what you did the first time so he could replicate it. They are so fascinating, he was upset that he couldn’t replicate what the head scientists did with you. He tried with us, to my knowledge we were the closest he got, of course, we can’t blow things up like Chanyeol—”

“Don’t you _dare_ say his name.”

“Or teleport like Jongin.”

“Stop it.”

“I bet if we could we’d have been able to save everyone.”

“Shut the _fuck_ up—” Baekhyun took a step forward and Taemin threw his hand out.

“Hyun, we need him alive.”

“I can tell you where your three friends are,” Huening offers. Baekhyun remained tense and on guard, choosing to answer Huening with silence. “Why don’t we make a deal?” Taemin squeezes Baekhyun’s shoulder and shakes his head.

“You can’t trust him, Baekhyun.”

“What’s your deal?”

“One person for three, what do you think?” Huening rose his eyebrows, a faux hopeful look on his face.

Baekhyun knew exactly who he was referring to, there’s no one else it could be, otherwise, why’d they be in this building with them if it wasn’t referring to the one and only Lee (Y/N)? Even if it was just to keep them distracted the only reason they’d have to do that is if they went to get (Y/N). But why? What could they possibly need with the second in line? Even if it was to end the SMTown family line, no doubt there were others that could easily replace (Y/N). So why? What made Lee (Y/N) so special BigHit revealed their new unit to SuperM in order to get them?

“Oh fuck this,” Taemin fires a shot and Baekhyun shoves him aside. The sudden sound of a mirror breaking echoed throughout the room and both members fell to the ground, holding their hands over their heads and bracing themselves for what was soon to come. Baekhyun looked around, watching the room they were in fracture around them until it all shattered and fell into shards on the floor.

“What… what just happened?” Baekhyun stood up and looked to Huening. “Where… _fuck_ , my head’s ringing… where’s the kid?”

“What do you mean where’s the kid?” Taemin pushes himself off of the floor and looks at the ropes that were scattered on the floor. He shakes his head and rushes over to Baekhyun.

“We don’t have time for this, I won’t tell anyone that you nearly jeopardized our entire mission for three dead men, Hyun, because only god knows what would happen to you. But for your sake and for ours, _shape up_. Don’t forget the reason why SuperM was formed. Don’t forget what happened to that one NCT kid, you should know better, Baekhyun.”

“Right, I don’t know what came over me,” Baekhyun sighs again. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be, it was heat of the moment, I get it, I did something similar once,” Taemin was momentarily silent. He turned his phone on, seeing that the signals were still jammed. “I’m going back to check on Taeyong, something’s wrong.”

  
“I agree, let’s agree not to speak of this, clear?”

“Baekhyun, we should at least—”

“That’s an order from your superior,” Baekhyun asserted. Taemin bit back his words.

“Alright, sure, fine,” Taemin pushed his gun back into his holster and walked past Baekhyun. Baekhyun picked up one of the glass shards from the floor, staring at it with piqued curiosity. He pocketed it and caught up to Taemin easily.

~

Taeyong threw his laptop onto the floor, stomping on it continuously until all that was left of it was an array of bolts and wires. He pulled the hard drive out and snapped it in half. He couldn’t risk any of the information on that laptop getting out, besides, it’s not like it had too much information on it, just a top-secret operation. One that couldn’t get out no matter what. Taeyong furiously tapped his earpiece, trying to get the communication channels back online with the old-as-hell desktop in front of him.

“Jesus… fucking hell,” he continuously let out a string of curses while he slammed the side of the monitor, trying to get the image to appear quickly. Soon, finally, he got into the terminal and started doing his thing. But as he typed codes into the system, he started to notice that he wasn’t in control of it anymore.

.

..

…

Sorry, Mr. Lee, can’t let you do that.

Taeyong slammed his fist on the counter, the keyboard shifting slightly from the force. He clenched his jaw and shut the computer off. He threw his backpack on and pulled his pistol out, walking out into the facility.

 _“The wolf is on the prowl,”_ that same heavily modified voice rang on the overhead speakers and Taeyong looked up, suddenly aware of all the security cameras pointed towards him. Usually, he was the one doing the surveillance, not the other way around. _“Shoot on sight.”_

“Fuck,” he took off down the hallway, the communication channels were a lost cause at this point, there would be no point in even trying to get them up with whoever the hell it was that jammed them in the first place. Taeyong had to find him and get rid of him first, he decided. He started to go through his brain, if he was a hacker, which he was, where would he be that would allow him to have full access of the facility and ready access to get into any piece of technology? He pulled up the lab’s map on his phone and traced the path towards the security guard’s office, making a straight beeline for it.

_Bang._

Taeyong stopped dead in his tracks just in time for the bullet to whizz in front of him. He turned down the hallway and saw someone holding up a hunting rifle. He stood tall, almost looked like he could’ve been a student himself if he wasn’t holding a rifle that was barely half his height.

“I wouldn’t take a step further if I were you,” he says, keeping the rifle trained on him. “I haven’t missed once, you know,” he finished, reloading it quickly. Taeyong looked around him, there was nothing he could use on his hand right now to get past this guy, and he wasn’t willing to try to just bolt.

“Taeyong!” Ten’s voice appeared behind the man while he tackled him down, disarming him with ease. “Go, I’ll handle this guy!” Ten shouts right as a knife lodged itself in his side.

“Ten!” Taeyong took a step forward but Ten held his hand up.

“Go! We’re running around like maniacs with the communication channels off! I’ll hold them back,” he pulled the knife out of his skin and threw it into the boy underneath him. Taeyong could only nod and continue on his way. He stopped in front of the office and ran in.

“Where are you, you little shit,” Taeyong took heavy breaths while he looked around. “I know you’re still in here,” he continues. The lights shut off in succession, leaving Taeyong in the dark. He looked around, straining his eyes to see anyone or _anything_. Then every screen turned back on, displaying a large, flashing swirling image.

~

“Soobin!” Yeonjun’s ran towards Ten, to which the latter easily moved out of the way, hauling the taller rifler with him. He pressed the knife to his neck.

“Take a step closer and I slit it,” Ten threatened.

“Do so much as hurt him anymore, I give Beomgyu the go-ahead to smash (Y/N)’s head through.”

“You don’t have them, that won’t work on me.”

“Are you so sure about that?” Yeonjun taunts. It was a bluff, it had to be. He knew you were smarter than that, even if you were stuck in an encounter you’d know how to get out easy.

“You wouldn’t do that because you need them.”

“Oh please, we just need the thing they have access to.”

“Access?” Ten’s eye twitched slightly, still holding Soobin in a chokehold.

“Oh, you don’t know? Makes sense, I don’t know if I should tell you,” Yeonjun scoffs. “I’d say ask them yourself, but I’m sure we’ve taken them already.”

“Oh _fuck off_ ,” Ten pressed the blade up against Soobin’s neck, a small hint of scarlet appearing on the cut.

“ _Wait!_ Don’t!” Yeonjun took a step closer and Ten moved back. He looked at Soobin with a terse expression. Then he looked behind him. “Hey… you should probably take care of that.” He points back.

“Nice try, Sherlock— ah!” Ten staggers forward, dropping Soobin. His hand flew to his shoulder, where the bullet pierced his skin. He turned around, gun drawn and ready. “Taeyong?!”

“Soobin, let’s go,” Yeonjun grabbed onto the other member and bolted while Ten was staring at the other member, who had a gun in his hand and a dazed look in his eyes.

“What the hell?” Ten reacted as soon as Taeyong held up the gun again. “What’s gotten into you?!” He continued. Taeyong didn’t answer and instead fired another shot. Ten looked around, trying to find out what could’ve caused the strange behavior, then he noticed the different earpiece in the member’s ear.

“Oh god, you have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for this,” Ten cracked his knuckles and charged. Taeyong dropped the gun and grabbed onto Ten’s incoming fist and twisted it behind him, flipping him over easily. “Have you been holding back in training?!” Ten groans while he grabbed onto the other member’s ankle, sweeping him off the floor and slamming him against the wall.

“Come on! Snap out of it, Yong!” He staggered over to him and slapped him across the face. He reached for the earpiece, but again Taeyong gripped onto his wrist and pulled it away. “Don’t make this difficult—”

“What the hell are you doing?!” Mark dragged Ten off of Taeyong and the other smacked him away.

“Move!” Ten just barely moved Mark out of the way when Taeyong fired another shot.

“What the hell are _you_ doing?!” Mark gasps, staring at Taeyong. Taeyong stood up slowly, the dazed look still in his eyes while he reloaded the gun quickly. “That’s not good.”

“No. And I could’ve fixed it if you didn’t get in the way, Mark,” Ten snaps. Mark held his hands up and frowned.

“Well I’m sorry, how was I supposed to know that he was brainwashed or some shit like that?!” Mark argues back.

“Mark!” Lucas ran into the hallway and Taeyong fired at him. “Oh shit,” he dodged it right on time.

“We have to restrain him and try to get that earpiece off of him,” Ten explains. “I’m going after those two who left!” He took off towards the general direction Soobin and Yeonjun went.

“Wait! Ten! I can’t! Shit…” Mark turned towards Taeyong. “Hi… Taeyong…” Taeyong lunged towards Mark and he jumped back, pulling out his gun out of pure instinct and fired.

“What the hell, Mark?!” Lucas, finally comprehending the situation, ran up and grabbed onto Taeyong, holding him down. “Ten said _restrain_.”

“I know! I panicked,” Mark held his hands to his head, fully understanding what he had just done.

“Well don’t just,” Lucas pauses momentarily, struggling to hold down the hacker, “stand there, take the earpiece out!” He continued to press down on Taeyong’s upper arms. Mark quickly complied, pulling the green earpiece out and, instantly, Taeyong stopped resisting. Mark held the earpiece to his ear, just enough to barely hear it, but once he heard it he dropped the device and smashed it.

“What was that all about?” Lucas asks. Mark just stared at him.

“It just kept repeating ‘kill all of them’ over and over again,” Mark shudders. Taeyong wakes up, shoving Lucas off of him and ripping his other earpiece off, a faint sound of buzzing emitting from it. The hacker slammed his fist on it.

“What just happened?” Taeyong asks he tries to stand up but falls back, wincing in pain. His hand flew to his chest and when he removed it he looked at the red dripping from his fingers.

“I’m so sorry, I panicked, I didn’t mean to,” Mark’s voice wavered and Taeyong sighed.

“It’s fine, I would’ve done the same,” he says.

“What the hell? You went all ‘kill or be killed’ on us, dude, what happened?” Lucas caught his breath while the other shook his head.

“I don’t remember much. I just ran into the security room and all the lights went out.”

“Right, okay, yeah,” Lucas furrowed his brow and Taeyong rolled his eyes.

“I don’t know, okay? I was so focused on finding whoever it was who jammed my servers I wasn’t paying attention,” Taeyong admits.

“Did you get them back up?” Mark asks.

“What do you think?”

“Oh, yeah, sorry, dumb question,” Mark frowns.

“Have you guys found (Y/N) yet?”

“No, you?”

“No, last I saw them was in that basement but it’s been an hour since.”

“Of course it has, I’m going to keep looking for them.”

“I’ll stay with Taeyong.”

“That’s not—”

“You’re literally bleeding out, Taeyong, so your opinion doesn’t matter right now,” Mark asserts. “Be careful, Lucas, we don’t know what we’re up against.”

“Yeah, don’t worry about me,” Lucas takes his gun out and walks in the opposite direction. Leaving the two NCT members behind.

~

Jongin crashed on the rooftop, sending you tumbling across the concrete harshly and landing in front of someone.

“Oh, that was easier than I thought,” he clears his throat. You looked up, seeing someone you didn’t recognize at all. “There, there, go back to sleep,” he reaches out for you, but you slapped his hand away.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” you moved away from him, holding the now reopened bullet wound on your abdomen. You moved your hand away briefly and looked at the thin coat of blood on it before covering the wound again. Jongin stood up and took a step towards you, but the other person pulled out a handgun and trained it on you. No matter how you looked at the situation, one wrong move would send you to your grave. If you stood up you’d get shot, if you rolled away you’d get shot, if Jongin teleported towards you you’d get shot, there was no escaping this situation and that much was clear.

“How’d you do it?”

“You’re not the only _exceptional_ human, you know,” the boy mumbles. “We just need this one, and we’ll leave you alone.”

“Fuck that,” you groaned, the world spotting around you. You had only woken up from the initial impact on the ground, but you wouldn’t be surprised if you knocked out again, and one could only hope that you didn’t knock out for good. You looked around you, trying to find some way out of this, something, _anything_ will do. The boy pulled the trigger and you squeezed your eyes shut, but felt no pain aside from the already existing ones. You stared at the bullet hole in your chest, right above your lab coat chest pocket, with interest, but decided that now wasn’t the time to be lost in your thoughts.

“(Y/N)!” Jongin sprang forward, reaching for the boy. Then, two gunshots rang out, one embedded into Jongin’s side and the other into the so-called “exceptional” human. You crawled over to Jongin quickly, seeing that the gunshot landed right on the wound he had gotten from his trip to America.

“Jongin, come on, wake up, don’t pass out on me now!” You shook his shoulders. Teleporting was always a physically taxing thing to do, he could only do so many at a time and bring so many at a time before he passes out, and a bullet wound was certain to knock him out. His eyes opened slowly, a hint of delirium in them, but he still grabbed onto your wrist and teleported you both out of there.

“Ah, and here I was, trying to stay hidden,” Seungmin steps out, reloading his gun slowly. “I wasn’t supposed to interfere, you know, I was supposed to leave as soon as the coast was clear, but I can’t have you killing my history partner!” Seungmin fires another shot into the boy’s leg. The other boy lets out a horrific shriek and backs away.

“What… what are you doing here?” The other boy asks.

“Just helping out a friend of mine,” Seungmin shrugs. “But, oh dear, I guess he wasn’t successful if since I just saw E-8 teleport off with (Y/N),” Seungmin frowns.

“You… Bang PD warned us about you,” the other boy stood up from the ground, the bullet wound healed over messily, and wiped the bit of blood that dripped from his mouth. Seungmin turned in slight shock.

“I bet he did, and my _god_ if I knew that BigHit’s newest unit was going to be this _wimpy_ at completing something as simple as a _collection_ I would’ve just handled you all myself and not called him over,” Seungmin’s words were laced with disdain.

“Him?” The boy grimaces. “And who would that be?”

“You’ll see, let’s just say he owed me a favor,” Seungmin holsters his gun again when the other boy took a step forward and stumbled to the ground. “Clumsy. Unoriginal. And _imperfect_. And you still have the audacity to consider yourself enhanced?” Seungmin clicks his tongue and kicks the other boy in the abdomen, digging his shoe into the injury on it. The other boy let out another cry of agony.

“You’re nothing, Choi Beomgyu,” Seungmin held the gun out towards him.

“How did you know who I was?”

“Oh, I know everything and everyone. Nothing escapes my radar,” Seungmin lays off of him, tucking the gun into his holster. “But, you know what? I can use you. Why don’t we make a deal?” Seungmin crouches next to the half-alive Choi Beomgyu and offers his hand with a twisted look on his face.

~

Again, you were treated nicely by being tossed across the asphalt, the searing pain of the bullet wound in your lower abdomen and who knows how many more cuts and scratches now that you’ve been unceremoniously launched. You crashed onto the wall at the end of the alleyway, feeling every bone in your body ache.

“Ugh… fuck,” you groaned. You tried to push yourself off of the ground, but your damaged arms collapsed beneath you.

You hated feeling like this, powerless, unable to do anything.

“Nini,” you called over to the unconscious body, with no response you rolled your eyes. “Jongin? Kim Jongin?” You called over to him again. You sighed and tried to push yourself up again, using a nearby dumpster to pull yourself up.

“God fuck this shit,” you grumbled, limping over to the passed out EXO member. You grabbed onto his arm, dragging him alongside you out of the alleyway, there was no point in staying there to die, after all, maybe someone would be nice enough to help you wherever you are. “Go to the lab, he said, it would help you, he said… Well, fuck me, right?!” You continued to drag Jongin behind you, the man bleeding out with every step you took, and finally made it out of the alleyway.

“Of all the times to glitch…” you groaned while you looked around. Around you were dark cement buildings, but it was beyond them that caught your eye, the high-rise buildings, the neon lights, you had no idea where you were. That is until you noticed the worn-down sign in the abandoned building next to you. Written entirely in Chinese, you were able to deduce exactly where you were.

“(Y/N)?” You turned your head around, you’d know that voice from anywhere.

“Yixing! Just in time,” you gasped. Yixing looked down at the bloody man you were dragging and his eyes widened.

“Oh, fuck, is that Jongin?” He jogged over and felt for a pulse. “Jesus… the radar spiked so I knew he would be here, I didn’t think he’d be like this,” he took Jongin from you and easily hoisted him up before looking at you.

“What happened to you two?” He eyed the huge gash on your arm.

“I’ll fill you in later, we have to get him help first.”

“Right, careful now,” you and Yixing turned a corner. “You’re lucky you landed here, we’re right by the base here,” he kicked the door to a certain rhythm and it opened quickly, allowing you both in. As soon as you stepped in you saw guns pointing at you.

“Oh _fuck off_ ,” you rolled your eyes.

“That’s the second in line, stand down,” Yixing’s voice was stern while he held one hand up. The guns were lowered in a second. “Someone get them medical attention.”

“It’s fine I can do it myself,” you spoke to him quietly, you’ve never been to the China branch of the mafia, nor did you want to. There was someone here you didn’t particularly want to see. Not to mention you were never the kind to go to hospitals anyway, you were more than comfortable with Joy.

“Just, trust me, alright, (Y/N)? Your grandfather would kill me if I didn’t do this,” he whispers, glancing towards the cameras.

Oh, right, you forgot about your grandfather’s “big brother” policy. You turned the camera and flipped it off before following the escorts to the medical room. As soon as Jongin was awake you’d be out of here, you had to keep reminding yourself that. No doubt you’d get an earful from someone as soon as you both arrived back at the SuperM bunker and good god you didn’t even want to _think_ about what Lucas will do.

“Ah, watch it,” you flinched your arm back from the woman who was bandaging your arm.

“Sorry, I’m sorry,” she shrunk away and cleared her throat, working more carefully. “I’m usually N-19’s nurse…” she mumbles. You went through the list in your head.

“Yangyang?”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck, I’m so sorry for you,” you laughed. A small reassured smile appears on her face, the last thing you wanted is for anyone to put you on some high pedestal, you’re not your grandfather nor would you ever be. “Yangyang’s a handful for sure, no wonder you’re a bit rougher, habits die hard I get it, and not to mention I applaud you for keeping your patience.”

“It’s certainly a challenge,” she laughs softly while she finishes up your bandages. “But not impossible, my younger brother was much like him.”

“Oh yeah? Make sure they never meet then.”

“Don’t worry, E-3 killed him.”

Your breath caught in your throat. Right, of course. Sometimes you just conveniently forgot that the EXO unit was in charge of assassinations, or just murder in general. You wondered how they did it, how they could cope with it. There were cases like Kyungsoo, who just shut himself off entirely, or even Chanyeol, who developed an entire new persona to cope, or even Baekhyun, who has just learned how to play it off. But sometimes, you wondered, what it really did to a person.

“What was your name again?”

“A-4…” she says.

“Oh, I know that. I mean your _name_ ,” you tried to gently pry it out of her.

“I’m sorry, it’s just not appropriate—”

“Oh my god, relax, I’m not my grandfather nor do I want to be,” you put on a smile to try to relax the tension and, after hew eyes widened, she returned the small gesture of kindness.

“Ningning…”

“What a nice name, I’m (Y/N),” you introduced yourself. You hadn’t been properly introduced to the aespa unit yet, so you were glad for the introduction now. Your grandfather briefly told you about the new unit they formed, their jobs were still up in the air though. So this is what he was doing, huh? The rest of the session went quietly, and when she was done she bowed her head slightly.

“I’ll come back when E-8 is ready,” Ningning nods her head and leaves you to your thoughts.

You pulled your phone out of your pocket, the bullet still lodged inside of it and, luckily, it was the one thing that kept you alive. You were kind of upset that you didn’t back your phone up recently, but nothing can be done about that. Maybe a conversation with Taeyong would be enough to get all of your data back surely, but your main concern stemmed from the rest of SuperM, they probably had no idea that you and Jongin glitched all the way to China. It was lucky enough that you glitched to one of SMTown’s bases.

You really wanted to avoid the China branches to the best of your ability, you didn’t have pleasant memories with certain members involved in it. Nothing bad, actually, you just felt responsible for a lot of what happened to certain members. It was a stupid thing that you tried to do, and you were even more stupid for getting the WayV unit in on it, you thought that since they were the most estranged from the main Korea base it would be easier but, of course, eyes and ears everywhere. Being here in the China base brought back those _unpleasant_ memories, things you could’ve stopped or prevented, but didn’t. Be it from your lack of experience or lack of empathy you didn’t really care anymore.

Even now, why did you stay away? Were you just afraid? Afraid of seeing the results of your actions? You never did speak to the WayV unit again aside from Ten and Lucas, the former because he was now involved in SuperM and the latter considering he was your primary bodyguard. There was part of you who just wanted to leave now with Jongin, the same part of you that didn’t want to own up to your mistakes.

You never forgave yourself for that, and you’d prefer not to think about it. Kun took the brunt of it, being the leader of the WayV unit, he did well to feign ignorance to what you, Hendery, and Yangyang put together, but everyone in that unit was involved and you knew your grandfather wasn’t dumb enough to believe that Kun wouldn’t know. But still, the “consequences” Kun ended up going through was enough to be clear to you, and to everyone who’d ever try to help you, that it’s a false hope.

Ever since that day you’ve both never spoken to each other, willingly or not. You were certain that your grandfather made it as such, actually. You’d never get accustomed to this, the terrible things, the network of crime, and part of you didn’t want to. Maybe this was your last bit of humanity, the thing that separated you from _them_. Or maybe it was just another false hope, once you were in the mafia there’s no getting out. If you tried to run away you _knew_ that your grandfather would have Lucas’ and Mark’s heads, you knew that if you ran away he’d find a way to kill your family, the ones that really mattered to you. One thing that came with being in the mafia was connections, after all, and you weren’t willing to see how far those connections extended.

“(Y/N)!” The door opened and in came Yangyang. “I heard you crash landed in front of the base, but I had to see it for myself, and _damn_ , you look like shit.”

“You smell like it, loser,” a tired smile came onto your face while he took a seat. He tilted his head towards the camera and you knew that you had to read into his words.

“How’ve you been? You don’t really talk to our unit that much.”

“Pretty good, I’ve just been doing the usual. Going to school, playing monopoly with Mark and Xuxi but we never finish, and we can never remember where we left off so we just start all over again.”

“It must be hard, right? I can only imagine the pressure, don’t you want to drop out? It would be easier on you,” Yangyang frowns, but his eyes held an expectant look. You couldn’t help but wonder what the meaning was behind them, did you want to know? “Actually, I heard that the boss is transferring our unit back to Korea soon, maybe you should wait up for us, what do you think?”

“Transfer? What for? My grandfather didn’t tell me anything about that.”

“Oh, right, yeah, someone mentioned that they’re going to need a lot of manpower, something about a new BigHit unit,” you shuddered at that, word must have traveled fast, you wondered which member of SuperM informed your grandfather already. “And based on what Kai said, I think you ran into them.”

“Yeah, we did. I don’t know how the others are or what they’re doing right now.”

“Just call them?” You held your phone up. “Oh, never mind then. Here, I can probably fix it for you,” Yangyang holds his hand out and you placed your phone in it.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“You mentioned Nini, is he okay?”

“He’s conscious, but Yixing said we should wait for him to fully heal before he can teleport you both out of here, it’s dangerous in his state right now and we have orders from the Manager not to use overseas and on-air transportation for a while,” Yangyang answers. He turns your phone around in your hand. “Did Taeyong make this?” He asks.

“Yup.”

“No wonder, if this was a normal phone it wouldn’t have been able to block a bullet like that,” Yangyang mumbles. “I’ll go fix this up for you, here, you can use mine so you don’t get bored,” Yangyang hands his phone to you and you laugh.

“How old do you think I am, eight?”

“You’d might as well be sometimes, (Y/N),” Yangyang poked the side of your head.

“I can still throw you out of a window, don’t get cocky.”

“Yeah, yeah, (Y/N), be right back,” he waves you off and leaves the room, leaving you alone, hopefully for a while this time. Socializing can be so exhausting, hence why you usually stay at home. You had only ever communicated with people outside of SuperM via email or text, actually talking to them was a different story. You leaned back on the hospital bed and stared at the ceiling. Then, Yangyang’s phone buzzed in your hand.

“Yangyang?” You called out to the door just in case he was still nearby, but no answer. You looked at the phone that was face down on your chest. Surely you should respect the boy’s privacy right?

Nah.

You flipped it over and looked at the contact, it was an unknown number. Out of pure curiosity, you swiped the slider and the phone unlocked, revealing the message.

Fr: Unknown  
'The base isn't secure.'

Fr: Unknown  
'There's someone in here who doesn't belong.'

Fr: Unknown  
'I instructed Yangyang to give you this phone so we should be in contact.'

Fr: Unknown  
'(Y/N). Be ready to run in 10 minutes.'

Fr: Unknown  
'I'll meet you outside of the base.'


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW: Shootings, Guns, Violence, Suicidal Thoughts, Implication of Character Injury, Mental Breakdown, Language

You stared at the phone, the five messages taunting you with a horrific tension behind them.

_Ten minutes_.

The words wouldn’t leave your head, and you got to work. You made sure the bandages were well tightened and dressed. To be honest, you had barely made it out of your laboratory the first time and you weren’t looking forward to escaping from yet another facility, but the camera at the corner of the room taunted you, and you didn’t know how to play things off smoothly to divert attention. You hadn't spoken to each other in years and this is the hello you got? Interesting, to say the least, you were expecting a much bigger _hurrah_ like event, but nope. Then, the phone buzzed again.

But then a horrible thought crossed you, something you should’ve thought of first. A breach in this base would only point at one group, the one you knew was assigned to always be on the lookout for potential hazards around the base when not deployed somewhere, and the sudden thought that their debt could increase tenfold for all seven of them rang alarms in your head. You hovered your thumb over the keyboard, wondering when to respond, you wanted to ask the Unknown number what their signal will be. But before your thumb could touch the screen, the Unknown number sent more messages.

That last message stuck out to you, but the idea that someone came with you and Jongin when you teleported here put you on edge and it didn’t help that Ningning was instructed to confiscate your weapons when you arrived so now you were relying on skill alone should you encounter someone who does not belong. Not that you were afraid, you were more than capable of doing such, it would just be more of an inconvenience if anything that you were not looking forward to. You stared at the phone again, wondering if there was anything more you should do with it. You pushed the phone into your pocket and walked out of the medical room.

Everything was as normal as you could think it would get. People moving around the main floor, all tending to their jobs and scanning surveillance cameras around the base. There were a couple of loud conversations, some you could understand, most you couldn’t, but from what you got they were probably talking about you. A sudden impromptu visit would, no doubt, raise some questions.

“Hello!” A voice came behind you, and you turned around quickly, figuring that it was meant for you.

“Hi,” you rose your eyebrow, watching his jittery behavior. He was tensed on all sides, probably sweating behind his neck too for all you knew. “Can I help you?”

“Yeah! Yes! Uh,” he cleared his throat. You sighed, he had to be new if anything. Probably some new NCT recruit that your deadbeat grandfather forgot to tell you about, you had heard something about two new recruits, after all, and you had yet to meet them. As much as you’d rather get to know him, the texts that came from _him_ kept your guard raised. “Sorry, I’m new here—”

“I can tell.” You wondered if this boy in front of you counted as ‘something that wasn’t in its right place,’ but you decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.

“Oh, you can? Haha… uh…” Again he clears his throat and you had had enough of him already.

“Look, tell me what you need to tell me so I can go.”

“Right! Uh, someone asked me to give this to you,” he holds out a key card and you took it, examining it before putting it in your pocket.

“And who would this someone be?”

“Uh, didn’t say his name,” he says.

“What unit are you in?” You couldn’t quell the building suspicion in your consciousness.

“NCT.”

  
“Which branch?”

“U,” he swallowed back more words and you relaxed slightly, he’s clear, and probably just transferred if anything. Not everyone knew about the NCT U unit, only a select group of individuals, aside from those in NCT themselves, were allowed to know about them. And those who do have access have the highest clearance.

The U unit, something that had been the center of many arguments with your grandfather, is not one you were keen on keeping around. As soon as your grandfather kicked the bucket you would be certain to deal with it, it would be the first step towards your grand plan, at the very least. One that has been in the works for ages and one you had only informed a handful of people about, that handful of people you knew you could trust. And a handful meaning _four_. But now you realized that you were staring, and you should probably say something to this new recruit so he doesn’t get even colder feet.

“Well, why didn’t you just say so in the first place? Thank you, on your way now,” you turned around and left him behind, making a straight beeline for an exit, when he stopped you again.

“Wait!”

“What now?” You looked at him.

“The key card… is for over there,” he points further into the base.

“Can you describe the person who gave you this key?” You continued to pry into him, the suspicion only rising once again.

“Pretty tall,” all the WayV members were so that was too vague, “Chinese—”

“If you don’t give me an actual description I’ll put a bullet in your head myself, don’t _test_ me—”

“I can’t… tell you… his name,” then it made more sense to you, of course, he would have to use an intermediary to get anything to you. And the security cameras that were throughout the compound were a constant reminder of that fact. You couldn’t blame this new kid for stressing over this, and you yourself had to be a horrifying person to talk to if they only knew the stories about you. You couldn’t help but wonder what they told this guy for him to be so death afraid of you.

“Oh, you got it from Hendery,” you smiled at him and shook your head, to this he responds with rapid nods. You haven’t really spoken to the other Huang since that incident, it was easy to forget about him, something you felt slightly guilty for considering he helped you so much that time. And you felt even worse for having to use his name when he probably had nothing to do with this key card anyway, but it was a small and inconsequential decision in the greater scheme of things. “Ah, look, we got all tied up for no reason. Best you learn your teammate’s names soon,” you walked past him.

“Right! Right,” he says.

“Sorry, did you ever mention your name? I’m assuming you’re either N-22 or N-23, right?”

“Ah, N-22!” He nods his head. “Just for respect’s sake, everyone calls me Jung!”

“Pleasure to meet you then! Send my regards to Hendery, I haven’t heard from him in a while,” you waved goodbye to him and watched him leave. “Bull fucking shit,” you mumbled. You held onto the keycard and continued on your way outside the base, you figured you couldn’t meet him at the front, too many cameras, the side alleys are off-limits too, the back was especially guarded, and that left one place. You had noticed that it wasn’t a priority camera from when you passed by the various surveillance screens, and when it did come around it was at the far right corner, easily missed by people who were prioritizing the more _important_ areas of the base. Not to mention the familiar figure monitoring them, the perpetually silent member, who made brief eye contact with you before returning to his job. He was risking a lot by letting this slide, you understood, you knew the story of what happened to him, it was something that Taeyong had confided with you in after _that_ incident after your failed plan involving the other WayV members, and it’s part of the reason why you distanced yourself so much from the China sub-branch of the ever-growing network of this horrible excuse of a pyramid scheme.

And that’s how you found yourself standing at the entrance of the incinerator, the area being outdoors for obvious reasons given the age of the building, and, of course, standing with his back towards you and facing the ablaze flame, a light that was shockingly dim but bright enough just to barely make out the outline of the eyepatch that circled around his head, was someone you hadn’t seen in quite some time, someone you had preferred not to actually. He was someone you owed a great deal to, but could never think of a way to pay him back properly, and he was always the one to never press it, to not easily hold grudges against people. Last you saw him he reminded you constantly that it wasn’t your fault but… who else could it have been? His? He barely had anything to do with it, he only took the short end of the stick in order to cover up for those other two idiots you convinced to help you. Finally, he noticed you were behind him, and he turned just enough so that he could hear you clearer, and the large and healed-over scar across the side of his face was a telltale sign of a memory that should’ve been best left buried.

“Kun,” you said his name first, and he was quick to face you entirely.

“(Y/N),” there was a nostalgic smile on his face, he was always one to keep people comfortable. From the stories you heard, he was often the first to talk to any new NCT recruits, he always made sure that they were taken care of despite the horrific circumstances. Of course, this apparently proved to be hard when you have a significantly _fucked up_ left-side of your face, the first thing anyone would think about was _how_ it happened, and the fact that he chooses to keep it a secret is enough for anyone to steer clear until they really get to know him. He let you walk to him. You pointed at the camera that was a good distance away from the incinerator, enough to see what was going on but too far to make out details. “Sicheng’s taking care of it.”

“Good, we should make this fast then,” you shifted your weight onto your less injured leg and waited for him to say something.

“Someone came with you, that much I know for sure,” he hummed. “When you landed the cameras started looping, and that’s when I noticed a third person taking off away from you and Jongin, before either of you noticed, I presume. Was there anyone else with you when you teleported?”

“Two other people, I’m sure, but they both stayed behind. One was too injured to move and the other, I assume, was doing the _injuring_.”

“And there’s no possibility of them getting caught up?”

“None at all,” you affirmed. “The only time Jongin can teleport things other than himself is if he’s holding on to them or if they’re holding on to him in some way. And as far as I know, it was just me and him.”

“I hope I’m not coming off as rude, (Y/N),” Kun suddenly changes the subject.

“You’re not, trust me.”

“Just, you know, a breach in the base could spell trouble for us in the WayV unit specifically,” he frowns.

“Trust me, that was one of the first things I thought of,” you looked at the fire, watching what was your things burning in it, and you only recognized them as yours when you saw the SM insignia on the back of, what once was, your phone. “Should I even ask?”

“Probably not.”

“I didn’t even back up my data.”

“It was already far beyond destroyed.”

“All those nudes wasted.”

“I know that’s a joke.”

“And if it wasn’t?”

“You do know that all of our phones are in a closed network, right? If you took any on it your grandfather would’ve seen them,” he glances over at you. “You… you are kidding, right?”

“ _Yes_ , of course I am, who would I even send them to?!” You barked back. “Just accept my lame attempt at making small talk, last time we saw each other you were taking a pipe to the face… _multiple_ times.”

“Didn’t have to remind me of that one, (Y/N),” his hand ghosted over the scar slowly. “Surprised I lived through that.”

“Paid off your medical fees?”

“Nope, not even close, haven’t even paid off the phone they make me lug around,” Kun makes an attempt at a small laugh, but it only came off as pathetic. “What happened in that lab, (Y/N)?” He asks, his tone taking that serious one he was most known for. The feared leader of the WayV branch, his left side of his face being the telltale story amongst people in the mafia for both his fearlessness, but to those who know the story it only served as a testament to his pure _stupidity_. But you would be lying if there weren’t other things that built his reputation, it’s not easy being the leader of the WayV unit, SM’s notoriously _misbehaved_ unit that pushed their limits one too many times.

“Word travels fast.”

“Taemin called it in.”

“I suppose they’re looking for me then?”

“Mafia’s on high alert to find you as soon as possible.”

“I bet,” you scoffed. You leaned against one of the steel crates adjacent to the incinerator, the moon was high above you and the night held a false sense of calm over all it looked over. “I don’t really know what to say. The guy who ruined all of the EXO member’s lives ended up being one of my college professors, I met five other kids he _royally_ fucked up, then I met another he apparently enhanced and, even better, there were four more of them after me and _even better_ they all wanted to either kill me or take me back with them. Great, right?”

“Sounds like a basic day in the life for a second-in-line to me, (Y/N),” he says. “Before coming out here I had twenty-eight missed calls from Lucas.”

“Sounds like a Lucas thing to do.”

“It’s his head on the line, (Y/N).”

“I know.”

“I’m sure you do, the boss will do whatever it takes to keep you in his line of sight, you know. Or at least within earshot, even now we had to take extra precautions to be sure that we can’t be seen or heard together, and I’m sure you know why,” Kun explains. He sighs and speaks up again. “Alright, I’ll give you two options. Yangyang’s waiting in the parking lot to speed you over somewhere where we can hide you from LSM, go back to the original plan, and all’s good.”

“And risk you either fucking up the other side of your face or dying completely.”

“Sure, maybe,” Kun shrugs. “Or, option two, we deal with this third mystery person.”

“Did you plan this out?”

“No, not at all, but we saw an opportunity and we debated on running with it.”

“Does Yixing know?”

“He knows what we need him to know, and he agreed to help us. Other than that, not even the other NCT members know.”

“All eight of you know then?”

“Eight?” Kun asks.

“Yeah, I just met the new guy over there, gave me this key card and everything. He said it was from you. Jung, I think his name was,” you held up the red card and Kun grabbed it, you were taken aback at the uncalled for force he used, but when he held it up to the fire to get a better look at it, he threw it in the incinerator without another thought. You knew just from that action that you had just made a _very_ bad mistake.

He didn’t even say anything more, but immediately made his way back into the base, and you were smart enough to know to wait a few minutes before following him, the last thing you wanted to do was add to his already drowning debt fees.

~

The air in the Bunker was tense, with five of seven SuperM members sitting around a table, not saying a single word, and not making any sudden or slight movements, aside from Yukhei’s bouncing leg under the table. If it wasn’t obvious, the mission was, in a large part, a failure. The only success being the files that Ten and Taeyong had recovered prior to the operation falling to shit, and now they had an even bigger problem to worry about. With a missing member and a missing person of interest, the group prepared themselves for the worse when the leader came back.

Finally, the door opened and Baekhyun sat at the head of the table, his hands were folded in front of him and he had an unreadably _pissed_ expression on his face. The other members knew for a fact that what he had heard wasn’t good, obviously, but they were more worried about what will happen to them.

The SMTown Mafia is, in short, _notoriously ruthless_. There were rumors that the members that had supposedly gone missing were only “taken care of” by higher-ups, then there was the thing that happened with Sicheng only two years ago, or the thing that happened with Kun, Hendery, and Yangyang just a few months after that, none of it was new to the members. Taemin, for example, knew exactly what happened when results weren’t optimal, he _knows_ , but he kept his mouth shut. Because to bring up the White Rabbit incident once again, aside from all of the trauma it would remind him of, would be a surefire way to get him _taken care of_ the same way his late best friend was.

And that’s a secret he will take to his grave.

“Jongin’s at the China base,” Baekhyun says. “No clue on where (Y/N) is at though.” At that comment, Yukhei sighed and Mark buried his face in his hands.

“I’m gonna be here forever, I’m never gonna pay that off, I’m stuck in this hell hole _forever_ ,” Mark mumbles. Yukhei puts his phone down, the various unanswered and undelivered messages to you displayed for any who were curious. “If I’m lucky, the boss will just kill me instead.”

“Don’t say that, Mark,” Taeyong says quietly. 

“Fuck… I might just do it myself—”

“ _Mark_ ,” Taeyong’s voice was more stern now.

“What?! The only reason why I agreed to watch over (Y/N) was that the boss promised to cancel all my debts and let me finally go home free! Do you know how worried my parents are? My friends? They think I’m doing some hot shot internship here but how am I supposed to keep explaining the scars and bruises? _Huh?_ How much longer am I going to have to lie?! It has been _four years_ , Taeyong! What kind of internship lasts four years? I can’t bull shit them anymore. And I can’t tell them what the fuck is going on with me because the moment those monsters in the high castle even think that I’m about to do it they’re going to kill them. And that’s going to be on me, it’s going to be _all my fault_ , and knowing the Manager he’ll make me pay for the funeral or cremation fees like the monster they are and that I’ll probably become myself!” Mark held his head in his hands, he balled up fistfuls of his hair and rested his elbows on the table, with his breathing labored and teeth clenched, it was clear the NCT member was on the verge of psychotic breakdown. The men sat in silence, processing the string of words that had just left their youngest member’s mouth and many things had been put into perspective for them. Mark was always the kind of person to internalize everything happening around him, he always overthought everything and overanalyzed the actions of people around him, and he was always harshest on himself. Taking on job after job after job hoping that he could decrease his debt even by a little bit so he could finally be home free, but no. That’s not how things worked. “And the worst part is… if (Y/N) is dead—”

“Mark,” now it was Yukhei.

“That’s going to be my fault.”

“Hey, don’t say that,” Yukhei’s voice was quiet.

“I wasn’t fast enough. Maybe if I ran fast enough I would’ve found them so much sooner, if I didn’t get caught up in places, maybe I would’ve gotten to them.” One thing that many people tended to forget, about you specifically, was that they were all in the mafia. That person Mark and Yukhei were sworn to protect was the entire _future_ of the mafia. And Mark would be lying if it didn’t cross his head that if he just… _killed you_ at the right moment, he would be able to leave. But he made a mistake, he got to know you, he learned what you liked and what you didn’t, he learned your similarities and differences, he did the one thing he promised to himself that he wouldn’t do in this mafia. You became one of his closest friends that he didn’t think he’d ever make. And you became important to him. He let himself get attached. Something he thought he’d never do again after Hansol.

“It’s not your fault, it never was, and it never will be, Mark,” Taeyong says. Baekhyun felt chills run down his spine from that statement, and he knew that Taeyong was implying something more than just the mission earlier. Taeyong held his own hand against his head, unable to shake the piercing ringing that tormented him just a few hours earlier. If it was too quiet he could still be able to hear the haunting phrase that repeated itself over and over again in his head, how embarrassing, to fall to something as basic as hypnotism. But what scared him more was the looks the other members gave him, specifically Taemin, who had been brooding over some unspoken of thought while glaring right at him ever since they got back.

Hypnosis wasn’t rocket science, it was just a way to bring out the subconscious, and the fact that Taeyong had tried to kill three members in his hypnotic state was enough evidence to the team that he couldn’t be trusted, not anymore. And that fact is what truly weighed the unit leader down. The trust that he had worked so long to build was gone faster than he could say ‘I’m Sorry,’ and who knows when he would be able to get even an ounce of that trust back, or if it was even worth it to try.

“So nothing then? We have nothing on where (Y/N) is?” Ten asks.

“Nothing.”

“What’s the boss going to do?”

“He’s giving us a week to find them.”

“And if we don’t?” Ten pressed more, but he, and all of the other NCT members, knew the truth. It was their greatest fear, they were more afraid of it than death itself, and Mark had already mentioned it. “What will happen to you?”

“No clue,” Baekhyun leans back on his chair. “We know for certain that (Y/N) isn’t with Beomsoo.”

“How?” Yukhei was next to speak up.

“I saw him retreating with Huening,” Taemin says. “They were too far for me to get in a good hit, but (Y/N) definitely wasn’t there.”  


“Don’t we have a tracking device on (Y/N)?” Mark asks. Taeyong holds up a silver bracelet.

“Not one that’s currently on them, to my knowledge,” he shakes his head. “That one guy gave it to me, said that he found it after Jongin teleported out with (Y/N).”

“So why isn’t (Y/N) with Jongin in China?” Yukhei started tapping his pointer finger on the table, obviously losing his patience.

“I ran into another student on the roof, said that he saw everything,” Ten starts. “I followed those two sons of bitches up there and just narrowly saw them escape, I found the student hiding there, he said there was another one there that the two were talking to.”

“So they got caught up with one of those brats, huh?” Baekhyun frowns.

“The student said that he saw them both teleport out, but one of the BigHit kids has the ability to interfere with abilities, it would seem. It’s possible that he sent them to two different places.”

“What was he doing on the roof anyway?” Mark asks.

“Well, he is a student at that university,” Taeyong took the liberty to answer. “He probably ran up there when Beomsoo signaled the emergency.”

“What did you do with him, Ten?” A darker undertone accompanied Taeyong’s question. With what that student saw, surely, he shouldn’t have been kept alive. SM had a strict ‘No Loose Ends’ policy,

“Sworn secrecy,” Ten answers. “Don’t worry, I’m keeping my tabs on him. It would look suspicious if there was a dead body, after all.”

“He has a good point,” Taemin says.

“And what if he saw their faces? Did he?”

“There was no way of confirming, but he said that he stayed hidden the entire time and couldn’t see, and the surveillance footage backs that up.”

“You did your work, I’m impressed,” Taemin tried to add a lighter tone to his comment, maybe he was getting sick of the serious atmosphere, as it wasn’t one that often accompanied the unit. But his attempt fell upon deaf ears, and the mood only darkened.

“Great, everything’s just great,” Yukhei rolls his eyes. “So what’s our plan of action now, leader?” He looks over to Baekhyun, who had been quiet this entire time.

“I’ll be in contact with Yixing, he’s the only one who might know a thing or two about what’s going on since he has Jongin. And once Jongin is awake we’ll have more answers.”

“And what about those five?” Taemin asks. “Last I saw them was when we ran into them after the whole scenario with Huening.”

“They’re at a protected facility in Gangnam. They’re running tests on them right now to see what happened to them, or, maybe more specifically, if they can be of use to the mafia.”

“And if they’re not?” Taemin inquires. Baekhyun doesn’t answer, he only stared at the other member, and Taemin got the memo. “So what now?”

“ _Now_ , we get to work,” Baekhyun says. “SM has eyes and ears everywhere, the boss sent an immediate order to all active operating members to keep an eye out for our missing person, so we’re working with the whole system here.” At that moment, Taeyong’s phone lit up with an incoming call, everyone’s attention diverted to it, and all of their faces went pale. Taeyong picked it up before it could ring a second time.

“Ah… Bo-ah? Yes… it’s Taeyong,” his voice trembled almost as much as his hands did.


End file.
